


Untitled Edward/Jack WIP

by bellepeppertronix



Category: Fallout 4
Genre: Edward is also oblivous, Emogene just wants to have some fun, Emogene thinks Jack is having fun, Family Drama, Friends to Lovers, Hurt/Comfort, Jack is not having fun, Jack is oblivious, M/M, Mutual Pining, No one is having fun, Pining, WIP, except maybe Wilhelmina, kind of, with her books and booze
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-16
Updated: 2019-11-24
Packaged: 2020-10-19 20:02:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 26,023
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20662964
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bellepeppertronix/pseuds/bellepeppertronix
Summary: Whatever he had been expecting, this man was not it.!!! IMPORTANT NOTICE!!! If you read this on a paid app, you have been swindled! It is originally hosted on archiveofourown.org and can be searched and read there FOR FREE!!!Please come visit the website and comment, and let me know if that is how you found me!





	1. The Meeting

**Author's Note:**

> My first Fallout fic! I played the Cabot House quest and couldn't stop thinking about it! That game is packed with so many layers and so many intersecting and parallel stories, so many characters, all with their own motivations...it's SO GOOD!
> 
> Please tell me what you think. Comments are life!
> 
> 9.19.19 edit - corrected line spacing for ease of reading. corrected (some) spelling errors. added additional parts.
> 
> 9.22.19 edit - separated into chapters. corrected some spelling errors. introduced other spelling errors.

“So ‘cause the guy’s a head-shrinker, he wants you do to an interview in his office in the loony bin?” Sammy asked. He flicked his golf cap’s visor a bit, tipping it back off his forehead and exposing the chronic driver’s tan on his left arm to dramatic effect when he scratched at his forehead. 

Not for the first time, Edward sighed, and wished inwardly that his car hadn’t decided to take that particular point in time to develop a complicated electrical problem. Sammy was a good guy, but when he decided to start ragging on something, he could be like a dog with a bone.

“It ain’t a loony bin, Sammy, it’s the Parsons State Insane Asylum. And c’mon, do you haveta act so flippant about it?”  
Sammy meld one hand up in a who-me gesture, his eyebrows raised in faked innocence. “Hey, look, I get it, you gotta do what you gotta do. You see what I’m doin’ with my time, now I’m outta the service too.”

Edward gave him a flat look, and Sammy snorted and laughed, “I’m just sayin’! You gonna be okay wrestlin’ crazy people all day as a guard in there?”  
“Don’t have much choice, if I want to keep eating,” Edward said. “Lucky your family got you a place as a cabbie, you know.”  
Sammy scoffed, rolling his eyes. “Yeah! Me, lucky! Stuck behind the wheel of a Yellow Cab of the rest’a my life!”

They rounded a bend, and the cab’s tires bumped twice over the change in pavement from concrete to cement as they entered the long drive up to the Asylum. Edward started paying attention to the scenery again.   
Just beyond the thinning fringe of trees, he could see the gables of the Asylum rise into view; then the walls, red brick faded with age, and the upper stories, the pale windows of shatterproof glass bordered in a pleasant green trim. 

If he hadn’t known any better—if they hadn’t passed several signs announcing what the place was—it would have been easy to mistake it for one of the nicer houses in the area. He figured that maybe, at some point, it actually had been; to one side there was a longer brick wing that may have once been an attached garage, or even a coach-house. The place looked old enough.   
There was a manicured copse of maple trees clustered just in the center of the horseshoe drive, and other trees growing around the building, like a toy forest. Almost immediately he noticed the yard workers in their dingy white coveralls pause and straighten to watch them as they passed.

“Hey, Eddie, check it out. You’d think with a place this big, they’d have Mr. Handys takin’ care of the scutwork, instead of these poor bastards,” Sammy said.   
“Might not be safe to have robots that have built-in flamethrowers around unstable people, Sammy,” Edward said mildly.  
Sammy snickered. “No shit? Wow, but hedge shears are so much safer...”  
Edward elbowed him in the arm, but his annoyance was a pretense and he knew it.

Sammy sidled to a slow stop just behind a large white van, whose drivers, wearing white white polo shirts and slacks, were lounging in the vehicle’s shade, smoking.   
“Seriously, though! Good luck, Eddie. Hope this is the break you’ve been lookin’ for,” Sammy said.  
Sammy clapped his hand on Edward’s shoulder and squeezed a little, and Edward mirrored his smile.  
“Hey, thanks, Sam. I’ll be seein’ ya,” he said. 

The two men in white gave him curious, unreadable looks, and he wondered exactly who he looked like, showing up to an asylum for the violently insane dressed as he was, in pressed dark gray slacks, a shirt that had seen whiter days rolled above his elbows. he’d gone out of his way and spent money he could’ve saved to get his hair trimmed, for crying out loud—knowing that in two weeks it would be shaggy and hanging over his collar and ears again. 

He didn’t like to think of his situation too hard—former employers suddenly dying and the in-laws descending on the fortune like vultures, and the help (himself included) be damned. But it had meant he’d been out of a paycheck, and that had been money sorely needed. His car staying broken-down was a testament to that.  
So, hoping the desperation wasn’t obvious, he straightened his shirt and adjusted the blazer over his arm, and pushed the front doors open. 

~

Parsons State Insane Asylum was huge, and Edward had to ask two different receptionists how to find the office. The first one was at a desk typing something on a terminal; she curtly demanded to see paperwork before grudgingly handing him a plastic wristband and providing him with incredibly vague directions before buzzing him through the first doors. A bored security guard, in bulky body armor and with a stun gun on his hip, sat on a stool beside her desk. He was listlessly flapping a newspaper against one leg. He gave Edward a single once-over, determined he wasn’t worth the attention, and went back to the paper. 

Then, after trekking through several back-halls he stepped out into a large, empty indoor courtyard, the ceiling overhead paned with glass and allowing in the cheery late summer sun. The place was empty, but faintly, from somewhere, he could hear strains of classical music, the notes faint and flattened by distance.

He crossed the courtyard and climbed a flight of stone steps, walked down another hallway and finally, finally he reached Dr. Cabot’s office.

The secretary who finally let him in did so with a pitying backwards glance that he caught, but was unsure how to interpret.   
Maybe the guy was some kind of hard-nose who liked testing people out during the interview, or the kind of Type A personality who expected ‘the help’ to be there early, before they were even asked.   
Maybe the long, wending path through the asylum was supposed to be a test of some sort, and he had failed by taking too long, or possibly going the wrong way.

He wasn’t sure; frankly, he wasn’t sure he should be overthinking it that severely, either. A job was a job, and he was well aware that he was qualified for this one.   
The office wasn't one of the grandiose little miniature palaces that rich, high-powered men liked to set up for themselves. The desk was sensible, and the rug underfoot a plain dark burgundy one. To the right side there was a folding screen with a reproduction of Monet’s Water Lilies on it, and he could just see a little metal tea service cart peeking from behind it, holding a crystal pitcher and a few drinking glasses. To the left side there was a small table with an intercom mic and receiver on it. Everything was simple and decorous and meticulously organized, giving the impression that a great deal of care had been spent to make the space look official without being pretentious. There were no furniture pieces upholstered in calfskin, no fancy single-cup espresso or coffee machines, no marble-and-gold fountain pen stand or gaudy objets d’art scattered around on the shelves. 

He had the distinct feeling that this office was not very lived-in. Maybe the man was more hands-on and preferred to be out and about, making his rounds; or else maybe he rarely ever came in at all. 

Edward stood a moment looking around, and hesitated a while longer before finally crossing around and sitting in the chair directly in front of the desk. He did not have long to wait before the door opened and someone stepped in.

Whatever he had been expecting, this man was not it. 

He was surprised to see a vague-looking, slightly mousy little man stride in from a door to the left, holding a manila folder pinched open between two fingers. He was one of the sort of nearly painfully average-looking men you passed by the dozens every day on the subway, squinting through their glasses at the newspaper or the latest Great American Novel--about a middling height, with black hair parted over his left eyebrow and pomaded down, and a moustache that was delicate in a fussy way that made Edward think of secretaries and old movies. He also wore a pair of black browline glasses, which really only cemented the effect.

He was wearing tailored khaki slacks and a robin’s-egg blue shirt. A simple Timex watch on one wrist, a plain dark brown leather band—nothing gaudy or overly ostentatious. His shoes were a pair of sensible taffy-brown oxfords. No other jewelry visible, which Edward realized had to be intentional. 

The biggest tell that he was rich, though, was how simple everything looked—no brand logos anywhere, and everything fitted immaculately. His outfit, though it looked like something straight off a mannequin at Macy’s or Fallon’s, was perfectly tailored, and each garment probably cost quadruple the price of the off-the-rack versions.

The only indication that he was anything other than some hospital board member’s nephew or son who had been given a nice, cushy sinecure was his demeanor, and his eyes.

Most of Edward’s rich clients hadn’t been terribly bright. Then again, they didn’t have to be; most of them had piles of money and people they paid to think FOR them. Hell, his last boss had been a very wealthy man with a collection of vintage cars, but he hadn’t even had the sense to set up a legally binding will, despite being a billionaire and having several houses, two ex-wives, and five kids. 

Dr. Cabot glanced at Edward and paused mid-stride, closing the folder to look at Edward with his complete attention.  
And then Edward noticed his eyes. 

The faraway look sharpened, like a camera coming into focus; he smiled, and it was polite, but there was something shrewd in the expression, as well.  
“Good afternoon! You must be Mr. Deegan!” 

Edward stood as he began speaking. They shook hands, Edward quickly cataloguing more details about the shorter man.   
Soft hands, but fingernails bitten to the quick; nervous habit, most likely. He seemed the type. Unexpected scars, too—small smooth patches, likely from tiny burns.   
“Good afternoon! Yes, I am. I’m here for the--”  
“The guard position, yes, of course! I cannot tell you how pleased I am that you were able to come on such short notice...and really, I must apologize for being so abrupt, but I haven’t lunched yet and I’m beginning to feel a bit peckish. Would you mind terribly if we went for something to eat?” Dr. Cabot was saying.

Edward was hardly in a position to disagree, though he was thrown off by this, a bit.   
Still, he managed a gamely smile. “Sure! I don’t mind at all.”  
“Excellent! I know several places that have good lunch menus,” the Doctor said. He stepped behind the folding screen that shielded the right side of the room, and Ed heard a rustle of fabric for a moment before the doctor came back around the partition, now stripped of the lab coat. He’d been right—the man WAS wearing a sweater-vest, navy blue with an argyle pattern of beige and brown diamonds across the front.

That he was so modest or so shy that he felt the need to step aside to take a coat off was unexpected; very old-fashioned, and oddly charming. Edward’s smile was unexpectedly genuine.   
“Lead the way, Dr. Cabot,” he said, stepping aside. 

~

There was already a car waiting for them in the drive—a bulky pea-green early-issue Chryslus Corvega sedan, with silver trim and white-wall tires. Though well-preserved, the car was nearly as old as Edward was—and he was 35.   
He paused and blinked, and had to take a moment to re-evaluate some things. 

It was possible, he surmised, that the doctor and his family had once HAD money, and were now the quiet sort of settled once-rich who were now ‘only’ Comfortable with a capital C.  
The driver, a severe-looking woman in a black uniform, stepped over to open the door for them with one gloved hand, taking the doctor’s briefcase with the other.  
“Thank you, Ms. Mah, thank you! This is Mr. Deegan, another candidate.”  
“I see. Very nice to meet you, Mr. Deegan.” she nodded at him once, and fitted a brittle-looking smile on her face, likely more for Dr. Cabot’s benefit than Edward’s. Then she continued, “Will you be going to Southmann’s Coffee, then, Mr. Cabot?”   
“No, not today, I don’t think. Hamburgers, that’s the ticket! Do you like hamburgers, Mr. Deegan? I am excessively fond of hamburgers...”  
And this was how the first afternoon of the rest of Ed Deegan’s life began. 

~

“Your references are excellent, of course,” Dr. Cabot said, setting the papers aside. “But, truth be told, they aren’t the thing I wish to discuss right now. Mr. Deegan,” he said, leaning forward, “I have a very, very important question to ask you, one which I hope you will weigh with an equal degree of consideration before responding. Can I ask that of you?”

Ed blinked a few times, thrown off by the other man’s sudden change in demeanor from jovial and light to an almost laser-focused intensity. Whatever it could be that could make the man shift so drastically, he couldn’t imagine; he’d spent the entire car ride over prattling about the local geography, his work, how excited he was that they’d recently finished retrofitting the historic Boston Public Library. Before they’d gotten out of the car, he’d been saying something about architecture and its continued care being a sure mark of a stable, intelligent society.

Edward half-wanted to ask what the question was before agreeing to answer it, but on some level knew better than to question things right off the bat. He knew how to keep his mouth shut; discretion, after all, was a large part of his job description. 

But Dr. Cabot was eyeing him with the same burning intensity, his eyes almost flinty behind the glasses’ lenses.  
The waiter set their water down and Dr Cabot thanked him without even glancing up.   
Finally, Ed took a breath and said, “Yes. I’ll answer your question, to the best of my ability.”  
“And with honesty,” Dr. Cabot pressed. 

There was the rub. If the question was something totally outrageous, then what?   
Edward nodded anyway. If this was the bullet he had to bite, so be it. There would be other jobs.   
Then the doctor glanced around once before locking eyes with him and asking the question.  
“Do you believe there is sentient life, other than humans, in the universe?” 

Edward was so stunned that for a minute all he did was sit and blink. And then, when he saw Dr. Cabot’s mouth start to harden, he cleared his throat quietly and glanced around once. When he saw that no one was watching, and wondered if maybe this was some sort of IQ test or other ploy, he said, “Well, statistically, it’s very likely. I think I recall having heard something on the news about scientists discovering a solar system like ours with habitable planets. So, yes, I think there’s probably something else out there.”

This was it? he’d been afraid the man was going to rake him over the coals for something. Instead, the guy was asking him if he believed in flying saucers and little gray people in tinfoil costumes, who went around zapping poor farmers’ cows with ray-guns. 

Somehow, he didn’t feel like laughing, though—either because of Dr. Cabot’s utter seriousness, or because the relief of being let off that particular hook was too great to warrant laughter.   
Dr. Cabot stared at him for another two beats, unblinking, and Ed was beginning to think that had been the wrong answer—before the other man finally took a deep breath. An enormous smile spread across his face. 

“Oh, Mr. Deegan! I am SO pleased you are treating this subject with the gravitas it deserves! I wanted to ask you in large part because a not-insignificant portion of my...private research is about this particular subject. And I cannot have someone working for me who does not, or indeed who CANNOT, understand the scientific importance and seriousness of the issue.” the doctor made a gesture with one hand, and the waiter returned with menus. Edward had noticed almost immediately that the young man had been hovering nearby—near enough to see them, but far enough t be unobtrusive.

Plausible deniability that anything fishy was going on. 

Edward filed these thoughts away for later—choosing, in the moment, to smile, to act polite and courteous and professional (all on autopilot) while wondering what to make of everything he’d seen.

The rest of the interview-slash-lunch seemed to dash past; Dr. Cabot seemed to appreciate his frankness, and the man was rapidly proving to be every bit as intelligent as the title warranted. If Edward hadnt been so conscious that it WAS an interview, he woud have relaxed more, and would definitely have asked more questions. What, he wondered, had Dr. Cabot meant when he mentioned his ‘private research’? 

Whatever the answer could be, he had two days to turn it over in his mind before he heard back from Dr. Cabot—via a secretary, one whose name he, later, would be unable recall.   
But he got the job.


	2. Chapter 2

“Ain’t they, ah...movin’ a bit fast, on this one?” Sammy asked him. They were sitting in Sammy’s cab again, parked in the lane just opposite the Cabot House. A single Mr. Handy was moving around, making largely ceremonial nips to a hedge heavingly full of cupped pink flowers. Surrounded by the hedge were a few trees, throwing the whole of the paved courtyard into dappled shadows. 

“Said they needed to fill the position as soon as possible,” Edward grunted. He couldn’t stop fussing with the cuff-links of the blazer he was wearing, feeling like an awkward rube in the clothes. It was new: a dark navy blue, plain to look sensible and solid and loose enough under the arms that he could wear a holster without notice. The shirt underneath was, too, a sensible blue and white gingham button-up, no tie because he wasn’t supposed to look like a suit, himself. 

“Yeah, but most places need a guy right away don’t also ask you to move in right the next month. You sure this guy’s legit?”  
“Sam, the place has a _plaque_ by the front door. I’m pretty sure the house is a landmark or something. Anyway, the rooms in there have got to be better than the dive where I’m stayin’ now.” Edward said, amused. 

“All right,” Sammy said, with another ‘who-me’ hand raise. “Just sayin’, if I was you, I’d...i dunno, hang some garlic in your bedroom. Maybe stay in your room at night. If you see a pale lady in a white nightgown go wanderin’ down the hall, DON’T follow her!”  
Edward finally laughed, at that, and elbowed Sammy. “Aww, c’mon, Sammy!”  
“What! I said I was just sayin’!”  
“Get outta here!”

~

He was surprised when he knocked and Jack, himself, opened the door; the house, the driver, and all the rest, had rather implied the Cabots would be the type to have an extensive staff.

Jack was wearing what probably passed for casual wear for him: a pale lilac-gray chambray shirt, rolled up to just beneath his elbows, and a pair of charcoal-colored trousers. The vague-scientist look had left him, and he was flushed, just slightly, his hair tousled over his forehead. 

“Mr. Deegan,” he said. “You are so punctual!”  
Edward shrugged a little, smiling, and said, “Of course, Dr. Cabot, sir.”  
Jack managed a straight face for all of two seconds, after that, before his lips quirked up into a sardonic little smirk, and he chuckled a bit. “Oh, no! None of that! We don’t stand on ceremony, here in Cabot house! Mr. Cabot will do fine for outside the office, and none of this ‘sir’ business! I get that enough from MacGillacuddy...”  
“MacGillacuddy?”

“The Mr. Handy. Mother tried to name him Smith, but my sister got ahold of his remote-access holotape and set the name choice selector to randomize, and she will NOT be persuaded to change it back. Ah, well,” Jack said, the smirk—or else the discussion of his family—making his eyes twinkle. “Sisters, eh?”

Edward chuckled, and inwardly became vaguely aware that this could turn into a delicate situation.  
He would not think of it as dangerous—he was too professional, and knew himself and his own judgment too well to be truly nervous that he would slip up and do something stupid—but standing there in his shirtsleeves, without a tie and with his hair mussed, the doctor had a bookish charm to him.   
Edward almost wanted to roll his eyes at himself. It was his first day, not even an hour in, and already he was thinking such things about his own boss.

Half of him wished he’d been some ugly arrogant windbag; the other half of him—the half that always wanted to buy himself flowers for no reason and that loved baking and decorating cookies—was glad that at least for this job, there was something—someONE—nice to look at.

Jack pushed the door open wider and gestured him inside, and then in another moment the door was closed behind him, the old-fashioned lock making quiet mechanical crunching sounds as the other man turned the keys.   
“Please, put your bags there. MacGillacuddy will be here to take them to your room shortly; I’ve already explained things to him.”

He followed the doctor deeper into the spacious manor, around a corner and into a parlor with high ceilings and walls with dark-varnished wooden wainscoting buffed to a dull, gleaming shine with time and care, and then upstairs into a maze of halls and doorways, pointing out bedrooms and closets. There was one hall where there were paintings hung above the wainscoting—tasteful, original works, obviously expensive and very old. But the important things were the wood and glass display cases full of strange artifacts, the sorts of things typically found in history museums.  
“These are some of my father’s findings, from sites across North Africa and throughout the Middle East,” Dr. Cabot explained, when he noticed Edward looking into the cases. 

“Sounds like he was very well-traveled,” Edward said, impressed. He privately hoped the man wasn’t the sort to buy this kind of thing from shady markets, but stopped the train of thought immediately; he supposed it wasn’t exactly better, if the man had directly taken the artifacts from tombs himself. He wasn’t entirely sure how he felt about it.   
“Yes, he is. My father was...an archaeologist, once one of the most respected men in his field,” Jack said. He looked away, his features turning grieved. “Yes, he was an archaeologist, in the days when the profession was a very masculine man’s-man sort of thing. I suppose I always disappointed him, in that regard.” then he glanced back at Edward and smiled; the expression did not touch his eyes at all.  
“Oh, well. that’s hardly the sort of thing you want to hear, is it? Let’s—do let’s continue the tour, shall we?” 

But Edward WAS curious. This little snippet of knowledge about the man only served to sharpen his curiosity further. 

When they were back in the parlor and the doctor had asked him to take a seat, and sent MacGillacuddy to bring them a pitcher of lemonade, Edward settled into the couch and tried to look like he belonged without looking too comfortable.

“If you don’t mind, there’s something I noticed, about the house.” Edward said.  
Jack made an inquisitive noise. “Go on, please.”  
“With such a large house, it may be a good idea to set up security cameras. It would certainly make keeping tabs on things easier,” Edward suggested.  
He was surprised to see the man stiffen up a bit, at that, his shoulders going tense. His eyes darted away and then back, and he said, “Mother hates the idea. She says it would spoil the look of the house, which of course you know is a historic site; and she dislikes the idea of the family being ‘spied on at all hours’.” he spread his hands in a helpless gesture. “I do apologize that I have no way to make your job easier, Mr. Deegan.”  
“Oh, no, that’s all right. I was just making an observation,” Edward said, smiling. “The old-fashioned way it is!”   
Jack brightened again. “Very good! Ah, MacGillacuddy!” 

MacGillacuddy pushed a small service tray, set with a pitcher of lemonade and two glasses of ice, into the room.  
“Your refreshments, sir,” the Mr. Handy said. He raised and waved the limb with the little pincers for fingers, by way of bowing.   
“Thank you, MacGillacuddy.”  
“Of course, sir. Also, sir, Mrs. Cabot telephoned and instructed me to notify you that she will be extending her trip another three days. I have already made Ms. Mah aware of the change in schedule.”   
Edward noticed the way Jack’s eyes widened slightly.   
“She’s decided to—well, whatever for?”

“There appear to be protests going on at Grand Central Station in New York, sir,” MacGillacuddy said. “Apparently the protestors have quite shut the station down, and due to fear of tampering with the tracks or somesuch at other stations, rail transit has been temporarily stopped. I DID offer to purchase an airline ticket for her, but of course she disapproves of such modes of travel.”  
Jack made a thin noise of annoyance.   
“She did also say not to trouble yourself; that indeed it is no trouble at all to stay with friends in the city, or to check into a hotel. I offered to make reservations at the Ritz-Carlton or the Harrell Suites, and she chose the Harrell Suites, as she usually prefers.”  
Jack sighed again. “Well, that’s...not fine, exactly, but I suppose it can’t be helped...thank you, MacGillacuddy.”  
“Of course, sir!” the Mr. Handy said. He made another hand-bow before pivoting in place and floating away.  
Edward always marveled at the Mr. Handys and Mr. Gutsys he’d seen, but he’d of course never lived anyplace big enough to warrant having one of his own, even if he’d had the several hundred grand laying around to purchase one.   
He was still surprised the Cabots didn’t have more than just the one; but then, from what Jack had told him of his mother, she seemed very old-fashioned, and probably barely tolerated the one.   
~

Not quite a week later, at two o’clock in the afternoon, the woman herself appeared.

He heard the car in the lane first; then the sound of car doors opening and closing, a woman’s sharp voice issuing commands.  
he’d been in the dining room helping MacGillacuddy set up for lunch. Jack was at Parson’s, and the house was quiet.   
“That will be Ms. Mah, returned at last with Mrs. Cabot,” MacGillacuddy said. He drifted away from the table and out of the room, and Edward followed him slowly, at a loose distance.  
In a moment he heard the front door open and the woman’s voice rising in volume.  
“--terribly dusty, after all, and it isn’t as if these things are—oh, MacGillacuddy. Take my things, and see to it that my green dress is sent to the cleaners’ at once! Oh, good HEAVENS, the CONDITION of things...”   
the woman speaking was thin, with white hair in one of those victory-roll styles that made it look like she had a large loaf of hair wrapped around the back of her neck. She was wearing a sensible tan skirt-suit under a camelhair duster; a brooch with real diamonds glinted from one lapel of the coat. She was wearing dark gloves on her hands.  
She had stepped into the foyer and stood half-turned sideways, and he saw she was fiddling with the button on one of her gloves. 

MacGillacuddy bobbed in place and then said, “There has been an addition to the household staff, Ma’am. If I might introduce to you--”  
before the robot could finish, she turned around and startled in place with a loud gasp.  
“Good GOD! who—Who on earth are YOU, and what are you doing in my house?” she said.  
Ms. Mah propped up an enormous rolling suitcase just on the doorstep.  
“That’s the new security guard, Mrs. Cabot. Mr. Cabot hired him.”  
Mrs. Cabot still seemed dubious, however; enough that she edged inside slightly, while Edward stood smiling, with his hands in plain view, and tried not to look suspicious. This should have been easy to do, since he was wearing a long white apron and had his sleeves rolled back off his forearms.   
“Well! I certainly don’t understand—well, of all the things!--he might have CALLED me, to let me know a strange man would be in our home!” she said. She seemed not to particularly care that he was standing right there, not even nine steps away from her. 

“My name’s Edward Deegan, Ma’am,” he said, with a polite wave. “I, ah, apologize for startling you. Just thought I’d come and say hello--”  
“Well, in the future, I shall thank YOU for not creeping around like that! Really! I MUST call Jack...Alison, do see that the car gets taken care of. And MacGillacuddy, the luggage…” she said, waved one hand at them as she passed, climbing the stairs.   
Ed heard some doors open and close, and tehn she was gone, swallowed by the maze of corridors and halls in the house’s upper stories. 

Ms. Mah hauled the first chest of luggage into the foyer with a grunt; wordlessly, he turned and helped her fetch the other two.   
MacGillacuddy took the smallest suitcase and went in the general direction of the kitchen/basement stairs, and it wasn’t until he was out of sight that Ms. Mah sighed. Ed gave her a questioning look, but she only shook her head. 

~

There was a learning curve, when dealing with Mrs. Cabot; Ed learned this very quickly in the course of the following weeks.  
For one, she seemed not to care that he was supposed to be a security guard, and in short order turned him into a man of all work; if he wasn’t adjusting light bulbs in flickering lamps, he was tightening the loose legs on chairs, and helping MacGillacuddy with the hedge out front, which turned out to be peonies.   
He learned this quite abruptly one morning, when he rounded a corner and found Mrs. Cabot kneeling on a little painted stool, apparently checking behind him to see how he’d pruned them.

“Good morning, Mrs. Cabot,” he said.   
“Good morning, Edward. This is very tidy work,” she said. “I’m quite pleased to see that you know how to prune plants properly; these are heirloom peonies, you know, and they won’t take being hacked at like some common boxwood hedge.”   
He chuckled a little, shuffling his feet in bashful pride that was only partially pretend.  
“Thank you,” he said.   
“I used to breed and show peonies. Lovely plants. They do take quite some time to grow acclimated, should they be disturbed, and so of course I am quite protective of them.” then she gave him a shrewd little look. “And I expect you thought Jack was the only one with any sort of scientific knowledge!” 

He had to smile. “I’ve learned not to make any assumptions, Ma’am.”  
And she had only nodded, a small, rather sharp smirk on her lips. She stood and watched he and MacGillacuddy work for a bit, and only after a long while, she picked up the gardner’s kneeling stool and carried it back inside the house.  
She liked being obeyed; she liked knowing more than other people knew; and last, but definitely not least, she liked having something to fuss about. She was one of those wealthy women born into a family of consequence, and who had been raised never to forget it—or to allow anyone else to forget it, either. 

Her chief joys in life seemed to come from fussing over Emogene, as she was not there to defend herself from it; and Jack, on the rare occasions when he allowed such ‘glugging’, as he called it. The other joys were gardening (usually by proxy, as she’d stand with a spade in hand, or a pair of canvas gloves on over a pair of khaki trousers and a white blouse, and direct MacGillacuddy and Edward what to do), reading, and expensive wine and liquor.   
But all this he only found out over the next few weeks. 

He was expecting this would be it; his new job, settling rapidly into the kind of worn-in tedium that made people age faster.   
He considered himself lucky he had a place that paid decently and provided room and board, and tried not to let it get to him too much when he thought about the room being a repurposed walk-in pantry, and the board being food he had to make for himself. 

It wasn’t terrible, he thought.   
It was also terribly tedious.   
So things would have continued, if not for a favor Jack asked him.


	3. Chapter 3

Edward believed in a healthy separation of work and free-time, which is why as soon as it was his day off, he was usually out of the house like a shot. When Sammy had a minute, he’d get a hold of Ed and they’d go see a movie or grab lunch; Sammy’s jokes had gravitated away from ghost women to stories about mad scientists, and how he’d better be careful or he’d wake up as a brain in a tank. 

He was still looking forward to Sammy’s good-natured ribbing, and maybe some doughnuts and coffee if he got out early enough, as he stood in the downstairs bathroom and rubbed a towel over his head for a bit. When he wiped the steamy film off the mirror, he saw his hair stood up around his face in a wild red-brown mane. He combed through it one-handed, yawning, and for all of two minutes considered going back downstairs and falling back into bed.

It was 9:30 in the morning on a Saturday.   
It was 9:30 in the morning on a Saturday, and Ed had taken a shower and peaceably shaved, humming snatches of quiet songs, and had just gotten dressed and stepped out of the hall bathroom, anticipating a peaceful weekend of puttering around and doing a whole lot of nothing. It was his weekend off. 

The sound of voices was a low murmur that did not increase much as he opened the door; going through the empty dining room, he could hear the sound of Jack’s voice, on the phone.  
“Yes, I will still be coming in today. Yes, I should be there around...oh, ten thirty? Would you please have those papers ready for me? And do please see to it that all the patients who have allotted phone visitation time are given their proper time slots? --and Mr. Murray is not allowed to call his wife, under any circumstances. Yes. Thank you.” the click of a phone meeting the receiver. Then, a deep sigh, followed by a chair creaking. 

Edward was going to walk back through the dining room quietly, and would have made it, if Jack hadn’t opened the other door and almost walked right into him.

Jack stopped just short of headbutting him in the chin, drawing back with a gasp; and then his eyes made the slow journey up Edward’s body, in an unmistakeable stare.   
If he was going to be silly about things, Edward told himself, it had been years since he’d been on the receving end of that look—and then the last time had been in a men’s-only barracks on a sand-blasted desert base on the other side of the country. 

His stomach did a half-eager, half-nervous flip.  
Jack was silent for a beat—long enough for his eyes to reach Edward’s face, then dart away in embarrasment, before he blinked a few times and spoke.  
“Mr. Deegan! DO excuse me,” Jack said. “I don’t normally rush around so late.”  
“That’s okay,” Edward said. “Late morning?”

Jack made a little half-smile, half-grimace. “Yes, though purely by accident. Ms. Mah did not come in today, or even call off, and now Mother is worried that perhaps there may have been some emergency. I told her, I’m sure it’s nothing serious; goodness knows the roads are a mess, what with all the traffic. And do you know, I heard they’ve changed bus scheduling several times this month, so who knows.”

Jack heaved another sigh, and for a moment looked so sad and put-upon that Edward felt a real stab of pity. He wondered if a huge, swanky house was a good payoff for never having any real free time—before remembering that the Cabots were probably loaded, and this was most likely just a ‘prestige’ job, or whatever they called it.

“You’re really going to the asylum on a Saturday?” Ed asked.  
Jack looked a bit rueful. “Yes, well. there’s an important package that I must pick up. So...” he said, with a little shrug, his head tilted to one side.   
They stood for an awkward moment together, before a clock chimed somewhere in the house; and then Jack blinked around and sighed again.  
“Well, since _I_ have no desire to be stuck in traffic, I’d better be off. Have a good day, Edward!”   
Edward nodded and waved goodbye, and once Jack had gone, he sighed and ran a hand through his still-damp hair.   
He’d probably looked like a wet and kind of rumpled, probably not how his boss wanted to see his personal security guard.   
Oh, well. Life was awkward, but like the great comedian said, no one made it out alive, so there was no reason to take things too seriously.   
He went back to the basement to grab his satchel, and after telling Mrs. Cabot that he was stepping out, he ambled to the bus stop, enjoying the cool morning air and the hazy, pale early sunlight.

~

But because life WAS awkward, he was only surprised for a moment when he saw a small, mousy man with black hair and glasses on his second bus. Ed grabbed a strap near the center of the bus, just behind the door and away from the worst of the engine fumes and dust.   
Jack was sitting towards the back, holding a book, with his briefcase in his lap. He expected the book would be some dry scientific text, so he was surprised when, after he got close enough, he saw that it was actually a novel—Neuromancer, by William Gibson. 

He hadn’t had him pegged as the type to like ‘frivolous’ things like that; after his initial little rant/ramble about aliens being real, and how serious the subject was, he was surprised to see him apparently as a fan of science-fiction books at all.   
Ed decided he wasn’t going to say anything; that he was just going to get off at his stop, and Jack was going to get off at his, and that would be it.   
Until Jack looked up, and their eyes met.

Jack blinked at him for a moment, and a tiny frown creased his forehead, before he smiled in recognition and waved his other hand a little. Ed waved back. At the next stop there was a fresh crush of people getting on, including a petite pregnant Black woman laden down with what looked like enough produce to open a vegetable stall. While everyone else was giving the poor woman dirty looks as she tried—mostly unsuccessfully—to navigate the narrow bus aisle with her bulging grocery bags, Jack hastily stood up. Ed saw him wave her down, and then gesture back at his seat. She thanked him, smiling widely, and settled down in the seat, her bags carefully out of the way. 

Jack shuffled through the press of people, until he was standing next to Edward.  
“Awful decent of you,” Ed said.  
“Let it never be said that the Cabot men are not gentlemen,” Jack replied. He threw sharp, annoyed looks at some of the other men, and got only flat looks or stony glares back in return—from those who bothered to look up at all.   
Ed hesitated a moment, but when Jack did not get the book back out, he decided a bit of small-talk with his boss would probably be the polite thing to do, and it wouldn’t kill him. 

“How’s the book?” he asked.  
Jack perked up instantly. “Fascinating! I do SO love speculative science-fiction. It always fascinates me, the sorts of technology that writers of the past believed we’d have today.” he paused a minute, and then amended, “Within reason, of course. I honestly wish they’d let some sci-fi ideas die—food pills, a la the Jetsons, for one. Ridiculous! But of course Gibson is a compelling author, lightyears—i tell you, LIGHTYEARS—ahead of most of his peers. Have you read anything of his…?”

Then Ed smiled. “Actually, yeah.”  
Jack’s smile was genuine and very charming.   
(Jesus Christ, Ed thought to himself, the power of a pair of big brown eyes and cute glasses…)   
“Ah! A fellow fan! Which of his works do you enjoy the best? His short fiction is amazing, and his Sprawl trilogy completely revolutionized the genre as we know it. Only imagine what we could DO, if only we had computers even half as developed as the ones he writes about!” Jack said.  
“It WOULD be pretty interesting,” Ed agreed. 

“It’s so interesting—Bradbury thought we’d have reached, and indeed colonized, other planets by now, and Stevenson and Ryman thought we’d have completely mastered genetic engineering. Gibson believed that we were upon the cusp of an information age of unprecedented power and reach, and Bradbury before him thought we’d enter into an age of complete mental complacency...” Jack paused a moment, then blinked up at him. 

Ed blinked right back. “Something wrong?”  
“Ah, heh. No...it’s just that I realized, I’ve quite been talking your ear off! I believe I asked you a question, before I ran off with the whole conversation.” and then, when Jack paused and smiled up at him, he was being polite; but he could see there was something else, beneath that. That the smile was genuine. 

Ed laughed. “It’s okay! Honestly, it’s nice just to hear people mention ‘em. I think the last person I made a sci-fi joke to looked at me like I had a second head.”  
Jack laughed a little. “I understand completely! You know, I always thought, with the science we have, people would be more receptive to the ideas of science being...transformative and restorative, both. And yet we seem to have looped back around to the 1950s, in more ways than one—but the most lasting one is a fixation on science as...more of an aesthetic, than a real practice, or way of understanding the world. Ray-guns and go-go girls in silver bikinis. there’s no real exploration of any scientific concepts...no thought behind how such devices might shape each and every detail of people’s lives, even in the most invisible ways.”

Edward couldn’t stop smiling, privately trying not to stare too much at the doctor. Listening to him was fascinating, and he kept nodding enthusiastically, listening in rapt agreement.  
Ed chimed in, “Yeah, everyone’s real big on the appearance of stuff. Funny how, back in the 1980s, there was this trend for everything to look boxy and modular, and that was how they portrayed the future in their movies. But, if you think about it, that was sort of the era of big global corporate mergers, so you could say the emphasis on everything being samey and boxy and beige was an intentional, ah, visual callout.”  
“Yes, yes, exactly! The same way that, farther back, in the 1940s, their ideal of the future was all clean angles, lines, and triangles, and glass domes and metallic cantilever arches. And then in the 1950s through the 1960s, they thought we’d have robotic houses that cleaned themselves, or that we really WOULD have levitating cities in the air. We each generate the ideal of the ‘future’ based on some more...extended, sometimes more extreme version of our present.” then he blinked. “So I see you’ve found some way to make the superficial into a point of interest,” he smiled again.

Ed shrugged a little. Privately he was strangely thrilled; talking with his oddly passionate boss about science-fiction while crammed like a sardine in a crowded bus was...not fun, exactly, but nice. Interesting.   
“Yeah,” Ed said. “The devil is in the details, like the saying goes.”   
And they talked more about books and science fiction, about how technological and social advances seemed to come and go in waves. Jack had Ideas about that, because of course he did, and Ed listened, nodding in interest. The noise from the bus meant that they had to keep leaning closer to one another to hear properly, which was no struggle. 

He didn’t realize how much time had passed until the bus’s dulcet automatic robotic voice annouced the cross-street near Parson’s.   
Edward startled a little. “Oh, damn! Was it just the announcement for--” he bit his lip before he could swear again.   
“What’s the matter? Did you miss your stop?” jack asked.  
“Ahh, yeah.”

“Oh! I’m so terrbly sorry,” he said. “Here—just a moment,” Jack said, and then fished his wallet from his pocket, and hastily pulled out a sheaf of bills, which he thrust into Edward’s hands.  
“What--” Edward began.  
“It’s the least I could do! That should be enough to cover cab fare from here to...well, wherever you’d like to go,” Jack said.   
Edward was still staring at the money with mingled disbelief and amusement.  
It was strange; he’d barely noticed the time passing, though he knew that particular bus ride was NOT a short one. 

But he thought about it. Sammy hadn’t returned his earlier phone call, which meant he’d probably gotten busy or had a customer who needed a long drive, and he’d probably be tired when he got back. And Ed didn’t actually NEED to go to the library; his books weren’t due, and there was nothing he strictly needed there.   
He made up his mind about something.

Instead, Ed gently curled his hands back up, putting the money bcak into Jacks hands. “How about I just...get off with you, and we can ride back together later. We could get some coffee or something, and keep talking.”  
Jack looked startled, then pleased. He smiled, and murmured, “If you’d like to, certainly. But, in case you have the wrong idea and think of this as work, I WILL promise an additional day off.”  
Ed laughed a little. “Sounds fair.”   
More people were beginning to board the bus, and before they were trapped inside the bus by the crush of people, Jack turned and darted through the crowd, Edward following him. 

~

They were met in the lobby by a harried-looking nurse, a clipboard wedged in tight into the crook of one arm and her face pinched with nerves.   
“Dr. Cabot! Oh, thank god you came so quickly! There’s been an incident!”  
Then while Jack sorted that out, Ed stood a polite distance off; finally Jack said something to the nurse, who hurried away. Jack came to him and sighed deeply, once. 

“I’m sorry. This looks like it will take awhile. Would you mind if I asked for a rain check on that coffee?”   
Ed chuckled, shrugging. “Sure, that’s fine. there’s no hurry.”  
Jack nodded, smiling, but his eyes were a bit sad; then he shook his head a little. “I’ll probably have to head straight back to the house after this, with the package.”

“Oh, yeah, your parcel! Well, hey—I could take the package back to the house for you.” Ed offered.  
Jack looked surprised for a moment, before he smoothed the expression away. “Edward, no! I couldn’t ask you to do that.”  
“No, no, it’s fine. I have to head back that way, anyway. I’ll drop it by the house and be on my way.” Ed said. He figured it would make him look like a good employee, and the truth was that he DID have to head back that way anyway, since there was nothing around Parson’s but miles of empty road and forest.   
Before Jack could protest again, someoen else—this time an orderly in a white uniform—hurried over. Jack spoke with him briefly, and then came back over to Edward. 

“I haven’t got much time,” he said. “Let’s head to my office. The package is there.”

~

The ‘package’ turned out to be one of those hard-sided metal briefcases, with three combination locks on the top and a large red medic’s cross on the one side.   
Jack had asked Edward to take a seat, and was gone for a moment; when he’d come back, he was carrying the case, already sealed.  
He was explaining, “It is not directionally-sensitive, but it is temperature sensitive, and must be delivered back to the house as soon as possible. My mother will take care of it, once you hand it off to her.”   
“Got it. If you want, I can call as soon as I get back to the house, to let you know when I made it,” Edward offered.

And then the drawn, anxious look on Jack’s face eased a bit; he smiled. “If you would, yes. Yes, that would be perfect!”

~

The ride back was unremarkable, but the relief in Jack’s voice when Edward called him was palpable.   
“Oh, Mr. Deegan! You’re a life-saver! I can’t thank you enough!”  
“It’s fine, really, Mr. Cabot,” he said.  
Jack said, “I will of course give you tomorrow off. Goodness knows I certainly wouldn’t want to spend MY day off rushing around on errands.” He went silent for a moment, and Edward heard other voices in the background; Jack said something indistinct, and then, after another moment, he said to Edward, “Ah! Well, I’ve got to go. Thank you again, Mr. Deegan!”

That was the first time he couriered the package, himself. He didn’t know, then, that it would become a regular occurrence.   
And then, one day, Jack asked him to meet him in the office to pick it up, and several things changed, all at once.


	4. Chapter 4

Edward sighed and scratched his chest, flipping the page on the ratty paperback he was reading.   
It was late October already but the summer heat refused to break; he was glad, for once, that his room was in the basement, because the rest of the house was a humid, muggy box. Even IF the smells coming out of the kitchen were sometimes revolting and other times tortuously delicious, and he had to rein himself in mentally to avoid going up there and salivating all over all the stainless-steel appliances and the exposed brick walls. 

The house was quiet.   
He flapped the book down against his chest and sighed. It wasn’t even an interesting book—some boring crap he’d gotten from the library the last time he’d been over that way, and it was barely holding his attention at all.  
He wished they had a television in the house. Anything to break up the monotony; he’d done his early morning and mid-morning patrols, and seen nothing more interesting than a stray cat sunning itself on the back deck behind the house. The highlight of his day had been Jack rushing around a little before seven, nearly frantic in that buttoned-down mousy way of his, which Edward secretly found hilarious and charming. Ms. Mah must have called off again, because he’d had to phone a taxi to get to work.

He wished the cat had been friendly. That would have been interesting, at least. Then he snorted and shook his head at himself, knowing he couldn’t afford to keep a cat even if he weren’t literally living in his boss’s basement. 

The radio was a welcome distraction, even if every three songs were followed up by a military announcement and roughly three commercials. He’d just switched it from a music station that was more commercials than actual music, to GX-N77, just in time to catch the tail-end of a Silver Shroud rerun. He’d settled more comfortably in the chair when the music abruptly cut and there was the sound of someone fumbling the mic, followed by the radio host hastily saying, “Interrupting our scheduled broadcast to make a breaking news announcement—there appears to be a crowd gathering outside the Super Duper Mart on Wallace Avenue. We are receiving news that there have been some...rationing adjustments...and certain individuals have become belligerent over these changes. Officers at the scene report the queue outside the grocery store, one of many in a popular Commonwealth-wide chain, is becoming agitated.”

Ed snorted and fished a cigarette up from the crumpled pack he kept on the table. He put it on his lip and leaned back without lighting it, pursing his lips around the end lightly as he listened t the news. 

Popular grocery store, my ass, he thought. There weren’t any other supermarkets left in the area, chain or mom-and-pop places. He considered himself incredibly lucky that he had both a veteran’s ration card and now lived with the Cabots; they were wealthy enough that they could just have groceries delivered, rather than sending someone to stand in line for them.   
And was this supposed to be the news, or a polite little ad for the grocery chain? He straightened up and took the cigarette off his lip, frowning.

Wallace Avenue was close to Parson’s; if the line was one of those monstrosities that wrapped around the block, the traffic was going to be a nightmare.   
He wondered if Ms. Mah had finally made it to work, and if she knew about the traffic situation.  
“Well,” he said to no one, and then stood up.

~

There was still no sign of the woman, and the Corvega was parked in the garage, the keys still on the rack by the door.   
“Huh,” he said, taking them down.   
Maybe the line was why she hadn’t made it in; maybe she’d had to go stand and wait and hope she’d be able to buy groceries, and she’d weighed her job against her empty stomach and chosen her stomach.

He wouldn’t have blamed her. Times were hard.

Still, he figured it was best not to wait til Jack called the house to ask where his ride was; he pocketed the key and headed back to his room to get his work blazer. 

~

by the time he made it down to that part of town, the traffic WAS terrible—a mess of honking cars and buses, and people in those obnoxious little single-seater roadsters that looked like carnival bumper-cars were zipping in and out of traffic. The honking was a cacophony.   
He rolled the Corvega’s window up and rubbed at his temples, sighing. 

The crowds were thickening—some looky-loos, some people hurrying away.   
An elderly woman, clinging with clenched fists to the backs of her two grandsons’ coats, was towing them away from the fray; one of the boys was trying to turn back to look, but the old woman kept walking, half-steering, half-dragging him. Her lips were pursed thin and her face was grim.

Over the general din and noise of the crowd—and honking car horns, and people leaning from car windows to shout at jaywalkers or other drivers—he could hear voices over loudspeakers, mechanical and flat.  
“Citizens, please remain calm!”  
“--Disperse at once! This is an unlawful gathering! Disperse at once! You have been warned!”

Through the crush he could see a line of police in body armor, with riot shields and batons at the ready. They were advancing in a line towards the crowd on the sidewalk. Behind the wall of cops was a Super Duper Mart.

He rolled down the window and leaned over.   
“Excuse me, Ma’am!”   
The old woman startled, gasping and drawing back.   
Edward waved and tried to look friendly.

“Sorry, I’m not from the area and I got a bit turned around. What’s going on up ahead?”  
She looked both ways before saying, “Those—those PEOPLE in the Super Duper Mart were passing out tickets! They said they were going to draw numbers, like it was a lottery. My grandsons and I have been standing on that sidewalk since FIVE this morning! FIVE O’CLOCK! And now those greedy—those greedy PEOPLE want us to gamble over who gets to buy groceries! As if the rationing wasn’t bad enough as it is, now they want--”

There was a shout, and the sound of a scuffle from farther up the street; then screaming and the sound of hurried footsteps. In another moment he heard breaking glass, and then more screaming as all hell broke loose.  
When he looked back up, the old woman and her grand-kids were fleeing, rushing as fast as they could to get away from the crowds. In another moment they were around the corner and gone.

Edward put the Corvega in reverse and backed up, turning back onto the main street where, even then, the crowds were milling and confused.   
Some cops in unmarked black cruisers were waiting on the corner, and he realized with a sick lurch that they’d set up a gauntlet that there was no way out of. In another moment the line erupted into complete chaos, people realizing what was going on up at the store turning to flee.   
He heard muffled popping sounds and moments later the telltale billows of grayish smoke spreading into the air; more screaming. Now there were people staggering and falling, others grabbing them to pull people up, more still trampling one another. 

Cops in riot gear were stalking through the crowds and swinging their batons indiscriminately.   
People were fleeing into the little shops and cafes all up and down the street, but he saw more than one shop owner rush to lock their doors.

Then with a sharp jolt of shock he realized one of the men standing on a stoop was Jack—looking completely bewildered with a paper bag in one hand and his briefcase in the other. Edward saw three more tear gas canisters arc through the air and his blood ran cold.  
He threw the Corvega in park, jerked the key from the ignition, and lunged out of the car.   
The air was sharp with the tear gas, and in six beats his nose and the back of his throat were burning. He shielded his face with one arm and shoved through the tide of people fleeing the encroaching line of cops.

Jack had gotten exactly three steps, and was clinging to a lamppost and coughing mightily into a handkerchief.   
A moment later Edward had his arm linked in Jack’s, and was guiding him back to the car when the shots rang out.

People screamed.

Edward yanked open the car door and thrust Jack inside, climbed down into the front and slammed the door.   
Then for a few tense minutes that felt like hours they he drove on, away from the crowds, the tear-gas clouds, the cops. 

“Are you all right?” he asked, when they were far enough from the action to hear themselves speak.   
Edward’s eyes stung and burned, and talking made his throat feel like he’d vomited needles. He was breathing hard and fast, and every breath stung deep into his lungs.   
Jack’s coughing had quieted, and he managed to gasp, “What the Devil is going on, Edward? Where is Ms. Mah? Has she—has she still not come in? Why are you driving the car?”  
Edward was suddenly, inexplicably furious. 

“She never showed up. What were you DOING out there?”  
“Walking back from the cafe where I usually eat lunch! I certainly didn't expect all hell to break loose! What in goodness’ name is are all those people doing, anyway? Why were those officers--”

“They’re PROTESTING, Jack! A loaf of bread is $25 and a gallon of milk is nearly $60, and they were drawing lots to see who would be allowed to go into the Super Duper Mart!” Edward hadn’t been shouting, but in the gulf of silence left after he spoke, he felt as if he had been. 

Jack was worryingly quiet for a long moment before he meekly murmured, “Well. I didn’t know that...”  
Edward passed a brief, disbelieving look at the doctor in the rear-view mirror, before managing to smooth his face into a relatively neutral expression.   
Jack, for his part, kept staring out the window, his surprise and bewilderment too complete to be faked.   
Edward relaxed enough to unclench his fingers from the steering wheel, and finally he sighed and said, “You really don’t know, do you?”

And when Jack’s response was a slow, wide-eyed head shake, Edward sighed and forced himself to take a few deep breaths, flinching at the burn in his throat and lungs.   
He started slightly when Jack touched his shoulder.  
Jack mumbled, “Thank you for...for protecting me. I didn’t mean to cause you extra trouble, and certainly not to get you tear-gassed.” 

THEN Ed breathed a sigh of relief, and the tension died. “It’s...well, it’s not fine. You should just...be more careful.”  
Jack made an understanding noise. Then he said, “I...think I’d like to go home now, actually. I don’t think I’d be much use back at the asylum, all shaken up like this.”  
Ed smiled a little, feeling relieved and strangely happy. “Home it is.”

To cover how palpable his relief was, he cleared his throat a few times, and then hastily fumbled with the radio dial before finding a station playing some slow, bluesy jazz.   
“Ah! This reminds me of Ella Fitzgerald,” Jack said, after a moment. “Do you know her music? Such a lovely voice...”

They spent the rest of the drive talking about music and musicians, and Ed discovered Jack had wide and diverse taste in music—he liked jazz, he liked electronic music, he liked things with a lot of string instruments and trumpets. 

“Lucky for you that jazz has come back in such a big way, huh?” Ed teased.   
But Jack’s response was a sunny, vague smile and him saying, a bit regretfully, “Ah, now! This makes me wish I’d paid closer attention the first time around! Listen to that HORN! Oh, I DO wish I had the time to take up an instrument. Do you play anything, by any chance, Edward?”  
“No,” Edward said. He wished he’d actually accepted when Sammy offered to teach him to play guitar, back when they were in the service together.   
Jack chuckled a little. “No time, either?” Jack asked, in commiserating tones.  
Edward laughed. “Not quite.”

They stopped at a light, and saw a pair of buskers on the corner. They were two young men and a young woman, dressed like beatniks, berets and all. Edward snorted a little and shook his head at how on-the-nose they looked—one of the men was playing a pair of bongos and the woman standing and swaying and strumming a guitar plastered with stickers. The other man was also holding a guitar, but seemed to be doing more snapping with his fingers than playing it.   
People hurried past them, most of them hardly sparing a glance. 

“Poor kids. They’ll probably be there all day before they even earn enough for bus fare,” Edward muttered.  
“I was under the impression that busking in cities was fairly lucrative,” Jack said.   
When Edward made a negative noise, Jack sighed.  
“I’m afraid I never CAN keep up with current politics,” Jack said, almost apologetically, by way of his explanation. “My work and research are often all-engrossing and occupy so much of my time and energy, I spend very little on other things. Emogene would tell you; I haven’t so much as gone out to see a movie in...quite a long while.”

Edward nodded and put a sympathetic face on, and was privately fascinated that someone had managed not to hear about what was going on. It seemed like every week there were more protests, either about the low wages or the sky-high price inflation on things. Just the other week he’d passed through a Red Rocket truck stop where the coolant prices were the same amount as some people made in a week. The prices fluctuated, but never dipped low enough to really be affordable. He could see now how some people could end up in serious debt just trying to pay for car maintenance. 

It seemed strange, that Jack could either ignore or overlook such things; but he figured the man was rich, and a doctor, so wealth, as well as his job, had either insulated him from those types of concerns and problems, or kept him so occupied he rarely thought about them.  
He was still thinking about all this when he swung them around the drive in front of Cabot house.   
When he parked the car, Jack gently touched his arm and said, “Thank you again, Edward.”  
Edward nodded and tried not to think too hard about too much.

~  
(two days later...)

“And now look at you, a cowardly, sniveling pantywaist who has not even got the nerve to speak o his own father face-to-face. Your mother coddled you into a little pencil-pushing weakling. I should have saved you when I had the chance; even military school would not have made a proper man out of you. I should have cut your throat and bled you in front of her, to make her selfish, stupid vanity plain. And I should have moved from you to her next, disposing of her like the vapid succubus she was. None of you can SEE, none of you have any vision, nor any idea of how insect-like you truly are.”

Edward was shocked that the man could speak to his son like that. He kept his face neutral, however, waiting with his hands clenched into fists on his knees and trying not to slouch in the chair.

Jack’s hands were clutching either side of the intercom machine hard enough that his knuckles and fingertips were yellow-white.  
“Father, I know you don’t mean any of these things.”  
“Oh, but I DO, Jack! Your continued denial of reality fills me with pity and disgust for you in equal measure.” 

Edward finally couldn't help it. His mouth dropped open in shock. 

Jack, however, was soldiering on. “Emogene sends her love. She--”  
“Ahh, the other little insect! What, your mother hasn’t managed to find a suitable man to pin her to some board?”  
Jack’s back went ramrod-straight, and he spoke in a stricken whisper. “Father!”

“It IS why she wanted to have another one. Another little dollie for her to play with. Anything to stop her incessant chattering at ME. She would have dressed you in ridiculous frilly things and completely ruined you, if she’d had her way. Though I suppose possibly the cage of decorum she calls her mind may have prevented her from crossing those lines. Mercifully for YOU. Not, of course, as if it mattered, does it? Does little Jackie still like to go down and catch froggies in the river?”   
“Father, if you keep--”  
“And make mud-pies? And play house?”

Jack was shaking, fine tremors wracking his arms and legs. Edward could see that his breath was coming hard and fast, and his eyes on the intercom were wide and glassy, and entirely vacant.  
Faintly, Jack continued, “I’m—i won’t be sending your books--”  
“Playing house in your mother’s apron, with the housekeeper’s dirty son? Oh, don’t pretend you didn’t lo--”   
Jack dropped the intercom mic, his hand slipping from the red button.   
Edward watched as he backed away from it with the kind of dazed wariness people use when they have locked a door against an intruder and they are still not convinced they are safe. 

He stumbled when his foot struck a chair, and Edward had to lunge to catch him and steady him on his feet.   
“Edward,” he bleated.  
“I’m right here,” Edward said, for lack of other intelligent things to say.  
“I’m s—I'm so terribly sorry you had to hear that,” Jack said. He took his glasses off and ran a hand over his face, his fingertips mussing his hair: a single lock came loose from the normally tightly-slicked style, and hung over his forehead, curled stiff with whatever product he used.

Edward could see, when he went to put his glasses back, that his hands were shaking. Edward felt almost at a loss, himself. Instead of speaking immediately, he went back around to jack’s desk and pulled his chair for him, gesturing down at it. “You look like you could use a seat.”  
Jack walked unsteadily over to the chair, and sagged down into it. 

He didn’t protest or make any comment when Edward poured him a glass of water, and then set the small glass in front of him, beside his computer.   
“I’m sure this is not...strictly professional, but I see...no problem in sharing this with you, as you’ve been nothing but trustworthy so far...” Jack said. His eyes were vague again, staring at the rug in front of his shoes. 

Edward cast a significant look over at the door. Then slowly, carefully, he settled himself in the chair just to the side of jack’s desk—not in the patient’s spot directly before the desk, not not blocking his path to the door, either, should he want it.   
Nonthreatening. Calming. He took a breath to steady himself and kept his face and posture absolutely neutral.   
“Shoot. I’m listening, Dr. Cabot.”

Jack had lifted the cup to his mouth and made a broken little scoffing noise, more into the glass than aloud.  
“Please, Edward. After...after sitting with me through that, please, call me Jack.”  
“Then, I’m listening, Jack,” he said.   
Jack fussed a moment with the cuff of one sleeve and finally took a deep, shuddering sigh before he spoke. 

“As you heard...my...my father is not well. Certainly not well enough to be allowed face-to-face visits.” he paused and took another sip of water, swallowing audibly. His anxiety was palpable, and uncomfortable.   
Edward wished there was something he could do to ease it, or fix it.   
But Jack continued, “And, as you know, he is also a patient here at Parsons. He is, in actuality, in a maximum-security room in the secure ward.”   
Edward made a sympathetic noise in his throat. “I’m sorry to hear that. I can’t imagine how hard this must be for you.”

Jack’s entire face seemed to slide down, his eyes gleaming in grief. His lower lip trembled for a moment, before he looked up and away, at the Monet replica painted on the folding screen. He took two gulps of water, his hand still shaking, and he nodded a few times.   
“Yes. it’s been...it’s been a very long, very trying time. I...remind myself that I must consider it fortunate that his condition is stable, at least. However!” he said, with an obvious effort to perk himself back up, “I have every hope that his sanity will be restored! I have devoted my life to finding a cure for his affliction.”

Edward made another understanding noise, wishing with every bone in his body that he knew how to say something eloquent enough to comfort the other man.   
But since he couldn’t make it flowery, he figured he’d at least make it sincere. “I can’t imagine what kind of hell it must’ve been, just trying to keep it together with the family, much less trying to cure him, too. you’ve got a hell of a lot on your plate, and you’re a good man for sticking around and trying to make things right anyway. it’s...a lot more than most would have done.”

Then Jack looked over at him, his mouth working silently for a moment; and then the grief gripped him and worked his lungs like a bellows.


	5. Chapter 5

When, the next morning, Ms. Mah still did not show, nor did she answer any phone calls, Jack gave up in frustration, while Mrs. Cabot sat on the couch with a glass of wine and grimaced as she listened to him make calls.  
“Oh, for heaven's sake, Jack, why don’t you just send Edward down there to see what’s happened to her? she’s worked for us for years; she hardly seems like the type to just up and vanish like this.”  
Jack gave him a searching look; but he glanced back at Mrs. Cabot and sighed.  
“Edward, if you could…?”

Which was how Edward wound up standing on the landing of the building Ms. Mah lived in, clutching a piece of paper with her apartment number and address written on it.  
The place was small, as they went, with worn blue carpet and narrow hallways papered in that ubiquitous pale-yellow color that all the apartment developers seemed obsessed with.  
He went to her door and knocked twice, but heard nothing. After awhile, he tried, “Alison? Ms. Mah? Jack sent me. Is everything all right?”  
Nothing.  
He was fishing in his coat for a scrap of paper to leave her a note when the door diagonal and across the hall opened a few inches.

The side of a woman’s face appeared in the sliver of open doorway, her blue eye narrow with suspicion.  
He smiled and waved a little. “Afternoon, ma’am. Sorry to disturb you. You wouldn’t happen to know the woman who lived here…?”  
The woman shook her head. “Haven’t seen her in days.”  
“Oh. Well, so at least you know her?”  
“What’s to know? She was quiet, minded her own business.”  
Edward blinked twice, something snapping into place in his mind.  
He smiled, hoping it didn’t look as artificial as it felt. “Sorry? What do you mean, she was quiet?”  
“I don’t want any trouble,” the woman said, in a hard, flat voice. “People stay quiet and mind their business, that’s all anyone can ask for. Listen, I don’t know anything, all right? So you can tell whoever you got down there waiting that they got her already, and this building is full of good people who just mind their business--”

There were hissed words on the other side of the door; the woman turned her head and muttered something he did not catch.  
He didn’t move from the doorway in front of Ms. Mah’s apartment, worried that any action would make his would-be informant clam up even worse.  
But he didn’t get to ask any further questions. The women closed the door abruptly, and he heard several locks snapping into place.  
The entire floor was dead silent, after that.

He returned to Cabot House and reported what he’d found to Jack.  
Jack, who looked stricken, and then very, very tired. “I’ve got some telephone calls to make. Edward, if you could...if you could come back in about half an hour, I’d be very grateful.”  
And so Edward went back down to his room, and sat and stared at the walls.

The woman’s words rang in his head like the ringing after a gunshot. Her fear had been nearly palpable, enough that he’d frozen in place in an effort not to scare her further. And that hadn’t worked.  
‘They got her already,’ she’d said. And she must have seen ‘them’ take her.  
He ran a hand through his hair, sighing hard. he’d known about the arrests, the internments, the deportations. It was hard not to hear about them, these days, especially when the courts were doing show trials that functioned more like Salem Witch Hunts than actual legal proceedings. He doubted they’d caught a single real spy, despite having ruined thousands of people’s lives. 

He waited the half-hour, feeling useless and stupid. And then, wondering where all this was going, he climbed the stairs to go meet Jack.

LATER

~

The figure on the couch did not move.  
Edward padded forward, pulling his pistol from its holster and taking a breath.  
Jack and Wilhelmina were safe upstairs in their rooms; the downstairs windows were all closed and locked. MacGillacuddy was in the kitchen powered down for the night, and so he wouldn’t have seen or heard anything. So, this was probably some poor drifter, he thought, or a very resourceful drunk who had jimmied the lock on the front door. 

And now he was sitting on Mrs. Cabot’s parlor sofa, the one by the stairs, hopefully not staining it but definitely leaving a smell--  
Edward flicked the light switch on.

Across the parlor, Jack flinched so hard he nearly threw his glass of water in the air. Edward immediately lowered the gun, his arm suddenly feeling stiff and wooden.  
Then, taking each other in—Jack in his yellow, brown, and white tartan patterned pajamas and blue carpet slippers, and Edward in the black henley and pants he wore when patrolling at night—they both blurted into quiet laughter. 

“Sorry, Jack! I, uh, didn’t mean to draw on you,” Edward said, as he holstered the gun.  
“That’s quite all right, Edward! I suppose it IS good to know that your reflexes are good and at-the-ready when needed,” Jack chuckled. “i didn’t mean to startle you. You don’t normally pass back through this part of the house at this hour of the night. I thought I had time to finish my glass of water and make it back to my room before I was noticed.”

Edward blurted a surprised chuckle. “Sounds like you’ve had practice at getting around without being noticed.”  
Jack snickered, his eyes going sly. “It’s very diplomatic of you to avoid calling it sneaking. But yes, I certainly do. Living with my mother, that was a skill I had to develop very early on.” 

Edward was a bit taken aback; he couldn’t just agree with his boss about how high-strung his boss’s mother was—though Mrs. Cabot was DEFINITELY the sort of Type A personality he’d thought Jack would be. But at the same time he didn’t want to contradict the man, sitting there in his pajamas.  
Edward noticed there were small water spots on Jack’s pajama shirt where he’d splashed himself; but his eyes must have lingered a bit too long, because the other man shifted slightly and chuckled, and glanced away. Suddenly Jack looked very self-conscious, and shuffled his feet on the rug slightly.

“Yes, er, well, not what you probably think. When I was a boy, we had quite an extensive library in the hall upstairs, where my father’s artifacts are now housed; I would sneak out of my room and pull down books that my parents thought were ‘too advanced’ for a boy my age. Much to my delectation,” Jack said.  
Edward chuckled. “That’s probably the most wholesome reason I’ve ever heard anyone give for sneaking out of bed.”  
Jack’s quiet laugh was really very charming. Like this, with no pomade in his hair, his longer forelock fell forward over his forehead when he laughed, and he had to reach up and brush it back. 

Edward realized how completely predictable he was being, thinking like this, but wasn’t embarrassed enough not to enjoy the sight anyway.  
Jack said, “Yes, well. If you were looking for stories of wild excitement, you might want to speak with Emogene. I have no experience at all in that regard...” he seemed to recall something. “Oh! I feel rather rude. Won’t you sit down a moment?”  
Edward smirked a little crookedly and spread his hands. “Wouldn’t want to be lax.”  
Jack, deadpan, tilted his chin a bit to the right and said, “You’ve patrolled the entire interior of this house twice already tonight. I think a break is in order. Besides, if anyone were to try sneaking in, you’re in the most centrally-located room in the house.”

And then Edward chuckled a little, feeling caught out. But he did come around and settle carefully down onto the other couch, a polite distance away. He was surprised the couch was as comfortable as it was; but they were clearly used, and well-loved; clearly not set-pieces intended to be kept in mint-condition to reflect the house’s status as a historical landmark.  
He filed the observation away for later.  
Jack offered him something to drink and he politely declined. Instead he asked, “Actually, I WAS wondering when your sister would be coming home.” 

Jack made a small grimace, there and gone so quickly that Edward might have missed it if he hadn’t been paying close attention. Jack looked askance and said, “Emogene enjoys traveling. she’s away from home as often as she can be; she and Mother do not see eye-to-eye on most issues, so they sometimes...butt heads.” he took a sip of water, very demurely, and added, “Really, it’s for the best. Only, I DO wish that she was more careful with the types of people she spends time with. Sometimes I really do believe she does things just to upset Mother.”

Edward made sympathetic noises and nodded. He half-wanted to tell Jack about his own brothers, how often he’d ended up the mediator in arguments, and how often he’d ended up being the one to hide the evidence to save them from getting in trouble when the were kids. 

Jack must have been lonely, Edward thought. He’d been working over the thought that the man didn’t seem to go out; he went to work, to lunch, and then came back to the house. In the months Edward worked there, he’d never seen him bring anyone home, and the man never even came back smelling like anyone’s perfume (or cologne; though everyone was stuck reenacting this terrible facsimile of the 1950s, he wouldn’t pretend that human nature could be sanded down and crushed into the bland TV censor-approved molds). But more than that, he never even mentioned friends outside of coworkers; not so much as a fond anecdote about as a group of college classmates or a best friend from his med school days. 

This was the puzzling thing. Most anyone else who lived in a palace like this would at least be throwing parties, if not big shebangs, at least little cocktail events with little canapes and people in overpriced clothing standing around laughing about how much money they had.  
He was used to those sorts of events; even liked them, actually, if only because watching people’s little dramas unfold was more interesting than…well, than being a glorified security guard. 

Yet the Cabot House seemed almost museum-like in its stillness and calm. The place gave the impression of having been shut up a long time, waiting for people to come back to it.  
He couldn’t put his finger on why, though.  
It hardly felt lived-in at all, and Wilhelmina was ruthless with her cleaning regimens, so much so that he actually pitied MacGillacuddy, even though the Mr. Handy couldn’t actually get tired. 

“Ahh, that’s just younger siblings,” Ed said, coming back to the conversation. “She’s gotta do something to ruffle your mom’s feathers. It’s not something they get over. My little brother saved up all his money from his first job. The first thing he did with it was go out and bought a motorbike. Big, red, and loud,” Ed chuckled, shaking his head.

Jack chuckled, a soft little sound that was more muffled breaths through his nose than laughter. His eyes crinkled up at the corners. “She had one of those little Vespa...things. One of the vintage models. It gave Mother the horrors to see her zipping around on it.” he chuckled again, his eyes going distant and a little sad. Then he shrugged a little and said, “Well, the gasoline shortages put an end to that. Your brother, I hope, has had more luck keeping his motorcycle on the road?” 

Ed chuckled himself. “Yeah, he’s a lucky little fella. Not so much as had a scrape-up. He DID promise Ma he wouldn’t, though, so he’s stickin’ to his word, at least.”  
“Is it just the two of you, too?” Jack asked.  
Ed shook his head. “There’s me, Evan, my middle brother, and Ellis, my kid brother with a bike.”  
“Three of you! And...I’m sensing a theme here...” Jack said.  
Ed snorted a little. “My dad’s name is Ellery.”  
He waited for Jack’s eyebrows to jump up in amusement; most people’s did. It was why he didn’t tell anyone that his father’s first name was also his middle name. When Jack only took another sip of his water and made an attentive humming noise, Ed laughed at how he missed the joke. But it was gentle, amused.

“Hm? what’s so funny?”  
“Nothing, nothing. It’s just that people usually ask if he used to be an old gumshoe. Like the, er. Like the old mystery novelist. They republished a lot of those books, so I used to get it a lot.” Edward said.  
Jack blinked a few times, and then smiled, and while it was warm, it was polite but without recognition. “I hope you can pardon me not catching many popular references. I really do spend most of my time in the lab, or at Parson’s. What time isn’t consumed with my work, I spend on my private research. I realize I am quite fortunate to have both the funds and the support and time to do both.”  
Edward had better manners than to ask and to pry, but he didn’t need to. The laser-focused look came back into Jack’s eyes as he leaned forward again, the glass clutched between his steepled fingers. 

“It’s no secret that the sort of private reasearch I do is not well-funded. As a matter of fact I’ve had people laugh in my face; usually colleagues who think it’s a harmless bit of eccentricity or some sort of get-up for...” Jack waved his hand dismissively, “’Plan 9 From Outer Space’ nonsense, women in tight silver jumpsuits, holding ray-guns and menacing the brave space-travelling hero with the artfully-torn uniform shirt.”  
Ed laughed out loud for real.  
“It’s a...compelling picture.”

Jack made a noise that was equaly irritated and amused. “It’s ridiculous and it trivializes the research! It’s for this very reason that I have so little contact with other researchers in this field. My father’s findings were compelling enough that I have plenty of material of my own to work with, anyway. And just think! If we really took the existence of other sentient life seriously—we, I mean, as a society, we as all of humanity—think of what we could accomplish! We have split the atom! We could outpace light itself, if only we thought to try to build such machines. We could MEET these very nonhuman people who must have spoken with our human ancestors! We could learn so much from them—indeed, from each other! Instead, we waste time menacing our neighbors with...bombs, floating aircraft carriers around other countries’ bays and...and ruining the oceans with sunken nuclear submarines too volatile to try and recover.” he made a noise of disgust.

Like this, he was not mousy at all; when he spoke about things he knew of, his eyes had a brilliant clarity, the intensity coming through as passion and fire. Ed didn’t think he’d ever been so fired-up about anything, himself, and here was this scientist convinced that if only the government spent less money on submarines, they could reach other stars. He wondered how much of it WAS real, and how much of it was the guy tying himself in knots over what ‘discoveries’ he thought he’d made.  
“I agree. There are a helluva lot better things the guys in charge could spend the money on, instead of more weapons. I’d know first-hand.” he shook his head. 

He didn’t like to talk about his time in the military. It hadn’t been something he’d actually thought about; he’d been young and idle, and his father—one of the sorts of patriotic men who always lamented that they WISHED they could have gone and fought Over There, except...(pick a reason, any reason)--well, his father had suggested it. And damn him, he’d gone.  
(couch flirting? Wilhelmina catches them? Who knows???)

~  
(Wilhelmina calls Emogene, who comes back in a rare fury the next day. Insert the scene where she pulls the stunt at the prison here.)  
(Ms. Mah has been arrested on suspicions of being s foreign spy. The Cabot family reacts. Then Jack says be will make some phone calls to try and get her released. Emogene decides this will take too long, and she makes Edward drive her to the detention facility immediately to try and force them to release Ms. Mah. It...doesn't go as planned...)

Jack finally hung up the phone, looking tired and nearly haggard.  
"Who was it?" Emogene asked finally, snapping the tension in the air like a piece of dry wood.  
"It was...Ms. Mah."  
"Alison?! Where is she? Where has she BEEN?" Emogene demanded.  
Jack half turned away, taking his glasses off and rubbing at his temples. "She's being held at the jail."  
"What in heaven's name FOR?" Mrs. Cabot asked. She sounded scandalized, but more indignant than shocked, as if the revelation was a source of annoyance rather than terror.

Edward began to feel his shoulders tense up just listening to the conversation.  
He'd had his suspicions about what had happened to the normally-reliable driver for days now, but the confirmation still made his whole body feel tight with nerves. 

Emogene gave Mrs. Cabot an annoyed look. "Because she's Chinese-American, Mother. And we're at war with them."  
"That is RIDICULOUS, Alison's family is from Napa Valley! Jack, didn't you say they emigrated here in the 1960s? This is RIDICULOUS!"

Jack waved a hand as if to ask for mercy. "She said some men came to her apartment last Monday, and she's only just now been allowed to make a second phone call. The operator said we'd be billed for that, by the way." Jack added, his voice almost distant.

Emogene's eyes turned flinty. "Nobody cares about a stupid collect call! Jack, we have t do something. You KNOW she's innocent and this is xenophobic bullshit, Jack!"  
"Emogene, there is no need to SWEAR!"  
"Mother, they are ARRESTING INNOCENT PEOPLE! If there's no need to swear now--"  
"Please, everyone, calm down! Mother, could you please get me Mr. Pendergrass's number? Emogene, I'm going to call our attorneys right now, and see what he can do."

~

"Turn left up here," Emogene said. Edward made an affirmative noise and swung the Corvega around.  
Edward knew the prison from hearsay more than anything else. It was with a sense of shock and worry that he took the side road, passing the two stationary security sentry robots, their guns held at the ready.  
There was a line of people already outside the gates—most Asian-American, some clutching manila folders or satchels that probably contained every scrap of identifying information they could find. Edward felt his stomach sink; all these people, their lives hanging by threads, either saved or doomed by having the correct scraps of paper with the correct signatures.  
Emogene made a noise of disgust. “This is OBSCENE. Innocent people going to plead their innocent relatives’ cases in front of some bigot warden,” she muttered. “All this, and for WHAT? Out of all those innocent people whose lives they’re ruining, they probably caught fewer spies than you could count on one hand.”  
Edward couldn’t think of anything to say; he made a noise of agreement.

They pulled to a stop in front of the gate house, the over-armored guard in the box cubby leaning on one elbow behind the bulletproof glass. His voice came through the intercom harsh and tinny.  
"Name and reason for visit?"  
“I’m afraid I need your help with that, actually.”  
The guard looked between Emogene and Ed, and Ed felt something heavy sink in the pit of his gut. He knew that look; the look of former soldiers who decided the services were too much work, but they still wanted to sit on their ass and pet their guns all day.  
“I’m gonna need something more specific than that, Miss.”  
“Well, you see, I’m expected, but I don’t know where I’m supposed to go,” Emogene said. The lie left her lipstick-red lips as smoothly as a hawk lighting from a building. She did a practiced roll of her shoulders and delicately pinched her sunglasses off. Her smile was so natural and disarming that even Edward felt thrown for a loop.  
In another moment she’d taken a key-card from her purse and handed it delicately to the guard, who swiped it at the console in the guard shack. His eyebrows did a confused jump when the machine beeped an affirmative noise.

The guard did a double-take.  
“Are you all right?” she asked. Her voice came out lilting and gentle.  
“Well, i—i just wasn’t told we were going to be having any visitors...”  
Emogene tilted her head. Her face was polite, but sharp; Edward had seen that face on rich women in cafes when they were told the establishment had run out of their chosen pastries. “I beg your pardon? You weren’t notified? But I am sure I was told to come here. Is there someone else I should speak to?”  
Edward flinched inwardly. He knew THAT tone, as well; the tone that implied that disobedience would be met with a cascade of Consequences—not violence, necessarily; but mysterious demotions or possibly even job terminations, possible blacklisting—a host of terrible things a vengeful wealthy person could inflict on some poor underling, all with a few words to the right manager or administrator.

The guard must have known this, too, because he backpedaled hastily. “Er—no, Ma’am, but it’s just that we’ve been told to be on high alert, due to the threat of possible Communist-Chinese spies.”  
Then Emogene gave him a pitying little smile, and leaned closer to the car window. “Do I look like a Chinese spy to you?” she asked.  
“No,” he said, and Ed could see him wringing his hands internally, the uncertainty and fear creeping into his voice.  
“Well, then,” she said, in satisfied tones. “There can hardly be more to say about THAT. Now...” and she spent the next few moments asking him a few questions, the majority of which slid off Ed’s mind like water off a duck’s back. He wondered if he was in some kind of shock.  
She must have reprogrammed the key card. While he was wondering HOW she’d done that, she concluded the little interlude with a polite little laugh.  
He pulled ahead when he heard the sound of her window rolling up. 

Emogene met Edward’s eyes in the rear-view mirror as they were pulling away from the guard-shack. Once she’d rolled up the window and they were out of earshot, she murmured, “I always do my homework. that’s all you need to know.”

But of course it couldn’t all be so easy.  
The secretary at the first desk inside was a woman maybe Emogene’s own age, with hair dyed a dark cherry-bomb red and pulled up into a bouffant.  
To either side of the doors they walked through was a guard, each of them armed with an assault rifle.  
Edward and Emogene were just in time to see an elderly Black woman turn from the desk, clutching her purse in one hand and an old cardboard folio in another. She was clutching handkerchief to her face, and everything indicated that whatever appeal she’d made, the secretary had turned her down. 

Edward hung back and held the door for the old woman, who blinked up at him and managed a wavering smile and nod of thanks before walking on. 

Emogene, however, marched to the desk with her shoulders back and her heels clicking on the floor like gunshots.  
"My name is Emogene Cabot, and I'm here t see a Miss Alison Mah."  
The secretary gave her a once-over with a raised eyebrow and pursed lips. "And your...relation to the prisoner? "

Emogene scoffed and held up her hands in a disbelieving gesture. "She's my employee and friend. And she can hardly be a PRISONER if she was never charged with a crime in the first place!"  
"That remains to be seen, Mrs...?"  
"MISS Cabot! Where s your manager?" Emogene asked.  
Ed was glad he had an excellent resting poker face, because internally he was staring at her wide eyed and screaming. Emogene had just gotten there and already pulled out the heavy ammunition.  
"There are TWO managers, the personnel manager and the prison manager. However,” the secretary said primly, “If you have any complaints related to visitation times or schedules, you would need to speak to the warden." the secretary re-straightened the paper stack. 

Emogene's hands twitched at her sides.  
After a beat of silence, she said, "So are you going to call him, or give me his number so I can do it myself."  
"The warden’s office phone is a closed line, that accept staff calls only. You would have to schedule a meeting with him in person."

"Then I want to schedule a meeting."  
“All right then. You'll just need to full out forms J-0AN, and M-IC, and provide 2 forms of government-issued identification, and proof of your relation to the prisoner."

Emogene had been staring at her with eyes growing wider and wider in indignant shock. Now she said, "Are you serious? This is ridiculous! Who can I speak to immediately?"  
"The warden is off-site today, as is the personnel manager."

"Who can I speak to NOW?" Emogene demanded.  
"Unfortunately, at this time, there's nothing else that I can do for you."  
"This s outrageous! This is unconstitutional! You people can't just throw innocent people in jails for nothing, and keep them there for however the hell long you feel like!"

Emogene’s indignation was getting the better of her, but Ed didn’t have the luxury of being oblivious; he could see the way the two guards were beginning to shuffle their feet. 

“Ma’am, it may be beneficial to go and put in a request,” Edward said, leaning just close enough to speak in a low voice. He knew his words would carry; that was of course the point.  
(Unhelpful Secretary bit; the security guards get antsy, Edward has to step in to save Emogene from being arrested too. Afterwards)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter brought to you by the over-use of the word "chuckled"! Thank your for reading.


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter 6???: Relationships

(not months, weeks later. Wilhelmina returns home first, then Emogene, at some point in earlier chapter. Emogene only returns because she learns that Ms. Mah has been thrown in prison. Also because she met a man and she wants to get serious with him, but of course Jack forbids it. At this point Emogene has only heard from them by mail and phone call, so shes just been quietly suspecting that Jack hired Edward for more than just “security”, but she’s had no way to confirm her suspicions…until now, she thinks.)

If the brother was strange and intriguing, the sister was strange and inscrutable—a wall of icy ennui. She was the sort of rich woman jaded and bored well beyond measure already, though she couldn’t have been out of her thirties. 

Having already worked in private security meant he knew her type. Born into wealth, to old-fashioned parents who likely saw her less as a child and more as a way to draw more money into the family via an advantageous marriage; or else kept around the house as a pretty decoration, doomed to live as a spinster in charge of her parents’ care as her brother pursued a career and kept the family name respectable and carried it on. The sort of woman whose family kept her on a golden chain and allowed to move about with what looked like freedom, but who was bored by what money could buy and keenly aware of what she was not allowed to have.   
(may move the above parts into earlier chapter?)

Edward had figured he had Emogene’s type down pat.

It did NOT mean he was prepared to see the rage simmering beneath the facade of sarcastic calm first-hand.

“If you would just--”  
“NO, Emogene! It is out of the question! Absolutely not!” Jack said.   
Jack did not raise his voice. Ed had seen him explode the contents of several beakers and once accidentally set a chemical flash-fire to an entire TABLE of materials, and the other man had expressed only the slightest frustration. And now he was shouting at his sister. 

“Why NOT! You won’t even—you won’t even let me talk about it! You won’t even MEET him, and Jack, you don’t KNOW him--”  
“I know enough to know that it is NOT safe to just start BRINGING PEOPLE OVER and TELLING THEM FAMILY BUSINESS!” Jack shouted.   
Emogene was silent for a beat, despair and anguish and exhaustion drawing her features haggard; then through the doorway, she caught a glimpse of Edward.  
Her face hardened into a mask of hatred. She stabbed one finger in his direction, so sharply that he had to catch himself before he flinched.

“You kept HIM,” she said. “You brought HIM in and told him ‘family business’. You told HIM about Father! Why don’t you just SAY it, Jack? Just SAY, ‘Emogene, you aren’t allowed to have a life until I cure Father, and then we all have to be a perfect Leave it to Beaver family like I always wanted.’”  
“That is NOT what I--”  
“Oh!” Emogene laughed, or sobbed, holding out her hands before letting them fall to her sides again. “Ohh, it’s not what you meant! Well, then, what is it?”  
“Edward is very important to the family! don’t go dragging him into this! He has been nothing but obliging and helpful since day one, and meanwhile this...FELLOW you’ve been going with is probably after your last name, and a stake of your inheritance!”  
Emogene’s bitter laughter was like coughing. “I haven’t even told him my real SURNAME, Jack! He doesn’t know who we are! And how DARE you accuse him of—of being some kind of gold-digger when you have to PAY yours to stay around!”

Jack’s eyes went wide, and he was shocked, for once too severely to respond.

Edward felt like someone had thrown ice-water in his face, and stood there barely remembering to breathe, wondering what Emogene had meant.   
But then Jack turned his head to look at him, his eyes pleading, telegraphing fear and despair with every line of his face. Then he turned very slowly and looked back at Emogene.  
Jack said, in a faltering voice, “You will not bring this up to Mother.”

Edward started to take a step forward.  
Emogene made a noise of annoyance—part scoff, part sniffle, before she snatched her coat off the back of the couch and stormed past him. She slammed the door behind her so hard the windows rattled, and Edward’s ears ached. 

In the thunderous silence that followed, Edward finally did step into the parlor.  
Jack was already talking. “You didn’t need to hear all of that. Emogene is—she can be very impulsive, and--”  
“What was that about?” Edward asked. 

He didn’t ask many questions. Even when he worried, he never asked many questions. He prided himself on discretion and reliability, and he figured he was good enough at listening and paying attention and inferring that he didn’t much need to pester people with excessive questions anyway.   
So he figured, since he did NOT ask many questions, the ones he DID ask were the important ones—the ones that deserved answers. 

Jack stared at him a long moment, his face blanching as he opened and closed his mouth.   
“Emogene is...has...I...”  
“Jack. Please.” Tell me the truth.  
“I...I can’t even express...how helpful you’ve been, how important, how vital to me--”

There. Edward was not shocked so much as… He stepped forward and touched Jack’s arm, trying to coax more out of him, more of those wonderful, beautiful, damning words. 

Because he knew this was not something either of them should do. Unprofessional, trite, possibly even dangerous, as there were other family members involved. And now he felt like an oblivious idiot; now all the admiring glances, the willingness to brag about him, the easy slide into an almost casual relationship, sharpened dramatically into focus.   
“Emogene has got the idea in her head that we...that you and I are...”

The idea made Edward feel equal parts excited and terrified. This was the sort of thing people were instantly fired over. The economic situation was not ideal, and the job market for veterans whose only work experience was as jumped-up security guards was even worse. 

But the thought of Jack giving him another one of those understanding smiles or sly sideways looks made warmth spread through him, made him feel a bloom of ridiculous, stupid, doomed happiness.

“And you didn’t want to correct her,” Edward said quietly. He answered Jack’s subtle flinch with stroking his thumb over his bicep, a gentle back and forth sweep.

And then Jack looked up into his eyes, his own brown eyes misty and suddenly so, so sad.   
“Oh, _Edward_,” Jack said, and it came out soft and breathy as a moan.   
It was the easiest thing in the world, to curl his arms around Jack’s shoulders, to pull him close. Jack made a soft noise when the side of his face met Edward’s chest. Edward felt something like relief, for a moment, then a wild giddy happiness galloped through him, his hands curling around Jack’s arms for a moment before--

Jack pulled away slightly, blinking hard. His lips trembled as he spoke. “Edward...we shouldn’t do this...”   
“I know,” Edward said.   
Jack’s eyes did finally fill with tears, then. But he looked more tired and resigned than crushed when he stepped away. He nodded, slipping off his glasses and pulling a handkerchief from his pocket to wipe his eyes. 

Then they stood a little apart—still much too close together to appear professional—and Edward watched the stars go out of his eyes as Jack took a few deep breaths, straightened his vest and his tie. 

Both of them startled when there was the sound of a car door closing and the rapid, sharp noise of Wilhelmina speaking to someone from across the courtyard.   
Jack gave Edward a last, lingering, soft look, before he reached out and ran his hand down Edward’s arm. He skimmed his fingertips briefly, gently, over Edward’s hand.  
Edward turned his palm outward and squeezed Jack’s hand once, and gave him a sad smile. Then a moment later he made himself take a step back—back into a respectful distance; made himself square his shoulders as he slipped into his usual relaxed parade rest. 

“It doesn’t change how I feel about you,” Edward murmured, and Jack gave him a wide-eyed look of such sadness and longing that it made Edward catch his breath.

When Wilhelmina Cabot came into the house, she found Jack sitting on the sofa and staring at a back-issue of the Massachusetts Surgical Journal, and Edward in the dining room, helping MacGillacuddy set up for dinner.  
Into the oppressive silence, she said, “Jack! I thought today was a work-day for you! And dinner STILL isn’t prepared? My GOODNESS, such a lapse I have NEVER seen!”   
Jack sniffled once and looked down the hall and into the dining room.  
Wilhelmina huffed and shook her head. “Well, isn't’ someone going to answer me? And where in goodness’ name is Emogene? I thought you said she’d come back, finally! Is she all right?”  
Jack looked back at her like a sleepwalker being wakened mid-stride.   
“Emogene is fine, Mother,” Jack said, in a flat voice.


	7. Chapter 7

~ (later. The war is going on but the bombs haven’t fallen yet.)  
Wilhelmina made an annoyed sound. “Turn that racket off, would you, Edward dear? Thank you.”  
“Mother!” Emogene sat upright abruptly, the stack of magazines to one side sliding off the couch. “I was LISTENING to that!”

“Why, whatever for? Goodness knows there’s always some ugly business going on overseas. you’d think those people would have the sense not to vote any old despot into power at the drop of a hat--”  
“Ugh, Mother! that’s not what’s going on. And anyway, how would you know? You never pay attention to anything!”  
“I know that all those politicians are all after the same thing, and most of them are dreadful! Arrogant, wanting to—to showboat, with who can have the biggest military, the most ships, whatever. They do not change, Emogene, so whatever you are struggling to work out, just know that.” 

Emogene knelt to pick up the fallen magazines, rolling her eyes as soon as her back was turned to Wilhelmina.   
“And don’t crawl about on your hands and knees! My goodness, you’ll end up with hands like a scullery maid, and potato picker’s knees. Edward--”   
“Edward is supposed to be a guard, not a valet. And honestly, Mother, it’s not the end of the world, if my knees aren’t—what, as white as milk? Tans are fashionable now. And who cares how soft my hands are? We can’t all go around with kid gloves on all the time, you know.”  
Wilhelmina, however, still gave Edward an expectant look, so he strode over and knelt to help Emogene pick the magazines up.   
“You don’t have to,” Emogene said. She sounded equally tired and annoyed, but Edward managed a little smile that he hoped wasn’t as strained as it felt. He said, “It’s all right.”  
“Ha,” Emogene said. “You shouldn’t. Really.”

“Thank you, Edward,” Wilhelmina said. She smiled—at Emogene—as if she’d won something.  
Edward realized there was something else going unsaid, thrumming like an electrical current in the room’s atmosphere.   
“If you’re going to expect him to do two jobs, are you going to PAY him for two jobs? Or do you want to finally hire someone else, instead of running him ragged?”

Wilhelmina rolled HER eyes, this time, and Edward saw the family resemblance mirrored so clearly it was almost jarring. “Asking him to earn his keep is HARDLY running the man ragged, Emogene.” she paused, and then pursed her lips. “And you KNOW how I feel about having all sorts of people just tramping in and out of the house, bringing in dust and...and you hardly know who people are anymore. Why, Jack might hire any fellow off the street, and we’d have another incident like the last one, with you-know-who.”

“He hired Edward, and HE’S doing fine. Fine enough that you have him stand in the corner like a footman, waiting at your beck and call,” Emogene said.   
Wilhelmina made an exasperated noise. “Really, Emogene, I just don’t know what’s gotten into you! You act as though there were something WRONG with our very lifestyle! Would you prefer if we got one of those hideous dome-headed robots—Protect-o-bots, or whatever they call them—to stagger around the house instead? Knocking things over and breaking my china?”  
“Has MacGillacuddy ever broken anything? And our ‘lifestyle’ is built on pretension, Mother! Look around! No one CARES if we don’t behave ‘properly’, if we have rough hands, if we have footmen pick up anything that falls on the floor just because YOU want to pretend we have ‘delicate, ladylike sensibilities’ and can’t bend at the waist without fainting!”

“Well, I DO care! There are STANDARDS, Emogene, which must be maintained! Just because you want to pretend those shrill women, with their ballots and bloomers, or the later ones, marching around, demanding we completely dismantle all of society--”  
“Any society that denies women RIGHTS shouldn’t exist in the FIRST PLACE, Mother! How CAN you be so—so--” Emogene made a noise of anger and frustration, gripping the hair over her temples hard.  
“Emogene, stop that at once, you’ll pull your hair out at the roots!”  
Emogene’s hands fell to her sides, but she gave Wilhelmina a look of disbelief. “Who CARES, Mother, it’s MY hair!”

“Yes, and you are MY daughter, and--”  
“The only reason you even HAVE any of this is because of ‘those shrill women’, because if those MEN you trust so much to ‘organize society’ had their way, this house and everything in it would belong only to Jack!”  
“Well, I should like to think I raised him well enough to know how to manage things, and to know his duties as a son, in regards to caring for his family.”

“He spends more time at the Asylum than he does here! And when he IS here, he’s holed up in his lab, doing his experiments, ignoring the whole rest of the world--” Emogene’s voice was rising, and by now she’d begun pacing, a tight L-formation along the backs of the couches.   
“You know your brother has very important work he must do to help your father, Emogene,” Wilhelmina said. “I really do not see why we need to continue to have these conversations over and over again.”

“Because YOU act like nothing I do—or WANT to do, since if we’re being honest, you hardly let me do anything—you act like nothing I do matters, or any of my thoughts are important!” then Emogene’s mouth twisted. “While YOU stay in here pretending nothing is going on in the outside world, only worried about your bridge club and the Arts Club Board and whatever pointless charity you’ve decided to support ‘because it will reflect favorably on the family’.”  
“Really, now! What happened to you thinking we ought to do something to help the unfortunate?”

“You and your friends sitting in the tea room at the Waldorf and eating finger sandwiches while you discuss caterers for thousand-dollar-a-plate ‘charity dinners’ isn’t actually helping anyone, Mother.” Emogene muttered. “At least when I was doing work it really meant something. Not that YOU ever took any of it seriously.”  
Wilhelmina sighed and rolled her eyes, folding her arms across her chest. “Well, when you behave like a spoilt girl of sixteen, what do you expect?”  
“Don’t sidestep the issue! I could have DONE something! I could have MADE SOMETHING OF MYSELF, Mother! If it wasn’t for YOU and—and Jack, dictating everything I do like I’m some overgrown CHILD!” Emogene’s voice was hoarse from the force of her pent-up emotions. He could see her eyes were gleaming with tears, but she didn’t look grieved—she looked furious.

But Wilhelmina only made a dismissive gesture with one hand, as if shooing a flying bug away. “Now, Emogene, you know perfectly well how dangerous it is for even Jack to go...out, as he does, exposing himself to all manner of dangers. There is no reason why you need to go do the same thing! And for what? To needlessly endanger yourself? To act like one of those--”  
“To be a FREE ADULT, MOTHER! TO LIVE AS AN INDEPENDENT WOMAN! SOMETHING YOU CLEARLY WILL NEVER UNDERSTAND!”

Edward felt like a piece of furniture, like a lamp or a coat rack. This was out of his pay-grade.  
This was out of ANY pay-grade. 

Sammy would have told him to cut his losses, kiss his last check goodbye and just dip out. Leave town, hell, leave the STATE. They were the kinds of rich folks so dug-in that they wouldn’t have come after him, or sent anyone. 

Edward though of Jack, and his sardonic little smiles, and the way his entire body seemed suffused with a contagious energy when he got to talking about something he was interested in. his old-fashioned, sometimes awkward style of speech. The way Jack remembered his favorite brand of cigarettes, enough to buy him an entire carton when a pack was almost an entire day’s pay. 

Of course that was the exact moment that Jack should open the front door.  
“Mother! Emogene! Edward! I’m home!”

Emogene whipped her head in the direction of the doorway, and Jack strode into the parlor and onto the emotional minefield, his blissful ignorance melting like an ice cube in a furnace.  
“What’s going on?” he asked. His eyes flicked between the three of them, trapped in their tableau like mannequins on a stage. “Mother, what--”  
“Your MOTHER thinks she can force all of us to stick our heads in the sand, like her,” Emogene snarled. She said the word ‘mother’ as if it was a swear; Jack seemed abruptly to come to grips with the situation. “That we can all just pretend everything is fine and magically it will be.”

“Emogene, you can’t just...is this about that man, Hudson? Hunsecker? You didn’t HAVE to break things off with him! No one forced your hand! I just wish you would be more discreet, is all. Mother, did you tell her she had to--” 

Wilhelmina gave Jack an arch look. “You know how I feel about her gentlemen followers.”  
Then Jack sighed. He glanced over at Edward apologetically, and then at Emogene with something like sadness, before he said, “Now, Mother, it’s hardly fair to expect her to lead the life of a nun. Although, Emogene, you really ought to be more careful with men...you don’t know who--”

Emogene’s voice broke into hoarse sobs when she spoke next. “I HATE you! I hate BOTH of you! And I HATE it HERE, in this GODFORSAKEN HOUSE!”

A sigh from Jack, thin and pained. Then he spoke in a low, quivering voice, “Then stop! Stop taking it! Just quit, right now, if you want so badly to--”  
“JOHN!” Mrs. Cabot’s shocked whisper, thin as paper and sharp as a knife. “How can you be callous? She is your SISTER!”

Emogene stomped rounded the second couch now, and in a moment she flung the door open and was out in the hall, slamming the house door hard enough to rattle the windows.

Edward looked between Jack and Wilhelmina, both silent; then, quietly, he said, “Should I go and get Miss Cabot?”  
“Yes,” Wilhelmina said vehemently.  
“No,” Jack said. He sounded exhausted. He set his briefcase down on the pool table and ran a hand over his face.  
“Jack! She’s your SISTER!” Wilhelmina looked scandalized.

Jack nodded, lifting his glasses to rub at his temples. “Yes, and she needs to cool down. Just...let her go. she’ll come back when she’s ready. She always does.”


	8. Chapter 8

Chapter ??? - Devotions

~ (later. The bombs have fallen and Edward has fallen ill from radiation sickness. Jack is nursing him through what he thinks is his last illness, feeling terribly guilty. This is Jack’s POV.)  
“Can you sit up for me?” Jack murmured.  
Edward tried twice, and it broke Jack’s heart to watch him. Finally Jack set the basin down on the bedside table and knelt, carefully sliding one arm under Edward’s shoulders and helping him sit up.

He felt a frisson of cold shock when he realized he could feel Edward’s ribs and every knob of his spine easily through his thin, wasted skin; and finally, as he helped him lean forward, he could actually see them through the sallow skin of his back. He smelled sharp, something worse than mere body odor seeping from his pores. Later, Jack would realize it was the odor of radiation sickness—the scent he would be unable to forget for the rest of his life.

Edward groaned slightly and coughed a few times, but otherwise was still and silent. 

Jack watched his back rise and fall a few times, before he reached out and untied the knots holding the gown closed. Carefully, he slid the arms down and off Edward’s arms, sadness and guilt in equal measure rising in him as he took in how bony the man’s arms had become. 

Blinking back tears, he wet the towel he’d brought and then dabbed Edward’s back gently, starting at his neck and working his way slowly down his shoulders. 

He paused when Edward began to shiver.  
“How are you feeling?” he asked.  
“’S just a little bit...cold...” Edward mumbled. 

The water was hand-warm. Jack had heated it himself on the little hot plate in the corner, not five minutes before.   
“Oh, Edward,” he whispered. “I am so, so sorry...”

He had spent lifetimes being careful, had spent decades biting his tongue and looking the other way, putting aside what he wanted in favor of doing his duty. But he had never before been directly responsible for anyone else’s death.  
Much less someone he cared for so deeply.   
he dropped the towel into the basin and wrapped his arms around Edward’s gaunt, shivering shoulders.

“Jack,” Edward rasped. His hand came up and grasped weakly at Jack’s arm, the side of his neck, before falling back onto the bed.   
Jack held him closer now, one hand cupping the back f his skull where the skin felt tight over the bone, and delicate as an egg. He could feel strands of Edward’s hair catch and snag in his fingers, and slough free from his scalp. 

“I’m so sorry. I should never have asked you. I should have—i should have—i should have sent you away, I should have tried to get you a spot in a shelter. I should have told you sooner. I am so sorry. I love you, Edward, I love you, and I am so, so sorry...”  
“Jack,” Edward whispered again, against his chest, and then Jack looked down at his face.  
His eyes were sunken and bloodshot, and his skin pale and sallow; but he smiled and whispered, “I know. I remember.” he stopped to draw a shaky breath. “I never...stopped feeling that way about...you too...”


	9. Chapter 9

Chapter 9??? - Meetings in the Moonlight  
Miracle of miracles, after the proverbial dust settled—once it was plainly, terrifyingly clear that no, the government had NOT survived the blasts; that the old society had indeed been destroyed by the blast-waves—things became...simpler. ‘Better’ was not the word.

But Edward lived. 

The radiation did something strange to him, however; where his skin cracked and peeled or sloughed off, it never healed properly. The bloodshot cast of his eyes never healed, either, and under the microscope, Jack said that his cells were doing a number of strange, fascinating things. He’d used words like ‘delayed senescence’ and ‘altered structure’. 

Two years after the end of civilization in the United Commonwealths of America, after countless millions died, snow fell on the roof of Cabot House, and Emogene’s jail-broken sentry-bot patrolled the front yard—stolen from a military convoy train that had derailed somewhere near what had once been Concord. Wilhelmina had thrown a fit when Emogene returned with it, but Emogene had been unyielding; Edward had been in no position to protect them, and the people they were encountering now were not mere burglars or thieves. Whole new societies formed and grew and died in what felt like the blink of an eye, and all of life had become breathtakingly perilous. 

Edward tapped the ash off the end of his cigarette and leaned back in the shitty metal chair in his basement room, and meditatively scratched himself.   
The little clock he kept on the table struck midnight.  
Maybe, he thought, he was busy and wasn’t coming.  
He sighed, and was just stubbing out his cigarette when he heard a soft tap on the door.  
Every fiber of his being leapt at the sound, and he was across the tiny closet of a room in two strides , pulling the door open to let Jack in.  
Jack, smelling of hospital soap and carbon paper even in his adorable fussy pajamas, deliciously warm and alive. Neither said anything; Edward closed the door one-handed, pulling Jack close in the same gesture. 

Jack wrapped his arms around Edward with a contented hum, his lips finding a ticklish spot on Edward’s neck. He held on when Edward snorted and twitched, and then Edward knew it was on purpose when he felt the other man nibbling the sensitive skin with his moustache.  
“Jack, you’re _tickling_ me,” Edward said, but it came out as a soft, breathless laugh. He made no move to pull away, though the ticklish feeling made the muscles of his stomach jump and tense as Jack peppered his neck with prickly little kisses.

Jack leaned back enough to give him a look of such false sincerity that Edward laughed again.  
“Would you prefer if I shaved?” he asked, batting his eyelashes.   
“You wouldn’t,” Edward said.  
“No, of course not. Then who would give you moustache rides?”  
Edward’s face was suddenly burning hot. “Tonight? Jack, I was working all day and I haven’t washed up completely. I won’t do that to you.”  
Jack leaned back with a little laugh. “I’m only teasing. To be honest, I don’t think I have the energy anyway; today was especially trying.” But he ran his hands up the planes of Edward’s chest, fingertips ticklish followed by warm, soft palms, skating lightly and then pressing. “Although I have to say, seeing you like this is _quite_ the tonic.”

“Ratty tee shirts and gray sweatpants do it for you?” Edward chuckled. “I always figured you’d want to clean me up first.”

“Edward, you’re a stunning specimen of a man. This is a scientific fact. If you were wearing a trash bag or a fig leaf, that wouldn’t change. Also, if I’m entirely honest, I don’ t think my back can handle your bed. I spent all morning bent over a microscope and fussing with that damn centrifuge.”   
Edward let his eyes drift shut as Jack continued petting his chest; he nodded and hummed an affirmative answer that deepened into a real moan when jack passed his thumbs over his nipples, and then began kneading the muscle of his pecs.   
A moment later Jack was mouthing him trough his shirt, one of Edward’s hands gripping the doorjamb behind the shorter man and the other rubbing at the back of his neck. 

Jack leaned back again long enough to say, “I DO wish you’d take a room upstairs. I’m sure we could find something for you without too much trouble. Even the upstairs closet is better than this...this cell. I should never have let Mother decide to have you stay down here.”

Edward made a breathy little noise of pleasure and rocked his hips forward against Jack, pressing his erection against the softer flesh of Jack’s belly, wanting and not wanting to pull him closer and try for more friction. He could feel Jack’s cock hard against his thigh, nestled neatly in the curvature between his groin and his thigh, hard enough that he could nearly feel the man’s pulse in it.  
The thought of it made his mouth water and his pulse pound.

Edward felt almost desperate enough to just unzip and rub one out right there, to unbutton the fly on Jack’s fancy modal sleep pants and pull his cock out and grind together until they both came hot and messy and ruined their clothes...

Edward took a deep breath and made himself move his hips away from Jack, the rising feeling of impending orgasm hitting a plateau and leveling off. He breathed a sigh of relief.

“Kind of hard to...oh, _Jackie_...to keep it a secret if she can hear the bed frame knocking against the wall,” Edward mumbled. “Besides, I almost like it down here. When she and Emogene get into arguments, all the concrete is a nice muffle for the noise.”  
Jack scoffed. “We should at least get you a better bed.”  
“We should get INTO the bed,” Edward said.

“What a remarkably suave line,” Jack said, cheerfully. Then, “Say, how would you like a suck-job? I think I’d like a cock in my mouth. Nothing quite like a midnight snack...”  
And THEN Edward managed to pull himself back, his whole body tingling and too hot and too cold at once.   
Jack was looking at him—not smugly, but curiously, as he looked at everyone and everything he found interesting. He cocked his head a little and licked his reddened lower lip.  
“Yeah,” Edward managed. “Yeah, that sounds like a good plan.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> where did everybody go? :(


	10. Outtakes, Part 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Scenes that i either had to cut, or couldn't find a way to cram in yet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> in case anyone is still reading.

Cabot “Family” Fall Party  
“Big family?” Ed asked, watching with fond amusement as Jack fussed with the vest, the lapels, and finally the starched, high collar of the suit.  
Edward had largely been excluded from all the fuss and primping; he was wearing a white shirt with tiny blue checks, and a dark navy suit—not so dressed-down as to be inappropriate, but enough to stick out.   
Security. Muscle.

Jack gave him a distracted smile. “Actually, no...most of these are Mother’s society friends...and some of my work colleagues. Usually, Emogene invites a few of her better-behaved acquaintances and friends.”  
Edward made a thoughtful noise. “Sounds more like a work function.”  
Jack looked distant a moment. “Yes...i suppose it is. We would invite family, if we were...fortuitous enough to have any others.”  
Ed realized hed put his foot in it. “Sorry, Jack. I didn’t mean...”  
“No, Edward, it’s quite all right! You couldn’t have known. At any rate, I’ll say that there’s a reason Mother is so over-protective of Emogene.”

~  
The party was the kind of social event where everyone showed up Dressed; not black-tie-and-tailcoat Dressed, but showy nonetheless. Edward strolled politely around the perimeter of the crowd , occasionally stepping into the yard to supervise the small army of valets hurrying around with the cars. The drivers stood in a little knot to one side, smoking and casting sharp glances back at their clients inside.   
“How’s it goin’,” Edward said, as he passed them, and the sharpness cracked a bit when they realized he was on the same social rung as they were. He got back a few ‘Hey, how ya doin’s’ and one or two ‘Fine, ‘n’you’s’”, and then was on his way back to the house. 

Women in ugly little fur stoles with the faces and feet still attached, despite the night still being balmy and relatively warm, and men fussing with cashmere suit scarves that probably cost half as much as a new car. He spent a pleasant few moments playing a game with himself as he watched the people climb out of their cars and walk up to the door. All the mens’ scarves were the same color—khaki beige, some plain and others with a tartan pattern. Burberry, he figured, or Hermes; he thought it was a bit ironic that, combined with the universal dark color of the suits, it looked almost like they were wearing uniforms. That was a lot of money to spend to look just like everyone else.

He snorted in amusement and finally turned away, walking around the back of the house to check the back deck.   
There was a faint breeze, and the trees were still dropping leaves, which had piled into drifts here and there (not, of course, on the deck itself, which Mrs. Cabot had insisted they sweep and scour that morning). The road was quiet, and out on the water a little boat was busily toiling towards the sea.   
Satisfied, he turned and went back inside. 

Edward ambled back into the mix, nodding decorously at servers in sharply-pressed shirts who were whisking around like ghosts with trays.   
Mrs. Cabot was ushering guests into the house, currently in the middle of greeting a pair of identical women wearing dark-colored dresses.   
Edward passed them, and found a circle of other older ladies sitting in the dining room, which had been converted for the evening into a miniature casino, complete with card tables and dealers. A bar had been set up in one corner, and the bartender, a short plump woman with dyed red hair, was making a show of pouring martinis in an elaborate, complicated way.

Having found the house perimeter safe and sound, he continued his casual meander around the house, taking in the part-going as a calm onlooker. At some point he acquired a glass of seltzer water, which he sipped slowly, keeping one hand in his pocket and strolling around with the sort of casual care borne of the knowledge that the worst he’d probably have to deal with was a squabble over scuffed shoes or misplaced stoles.

He lingered awhile in the little toy casino, in a corner beside a tall potted palm. After watching the bartender run through a considerable repertoire of mixed drinks, he took another turn around the house. Walking back into the foyer, he found Jack quite literally cornered by the staircase, by a circle of two men and one woman.

One man was clearly too far in his cups for the time of evening; he held a glass of wine in one hand and a half-gone cigarette in the other, and was talking—very animatedly—about something.   
The woman was blonde, on the tall side, and made more dramatic still by the black stiletto heels she was wearing. She kept shifting on her feet subtly, nodding and smiling the most pinched smile Ed had ever seen in his life.

The other man was something else—like a cross between a store mannequin and some comic artist’s idea of an ideal man, but with features somehow both too harsh and too angular. A caricatre of all-American masculinity, complete with an ugly flat-top haircut and a shave so close his skin was shiny-pink and plastic-looking. The set of his jaw reminded Ed of a prizefighter about to completely crush a smaller opponent.  
Jack was laughing nervously, a half-empty wineglass in one hand. “I hardly have time for all that,” he was saying.

The All-American Chiselled Jaw would not leave it alone, though; he smirked and said, “You can’t tell me you aren’t tired of trusting your stomach to Port-o-Diner food, or the hackneyed recipes of a Mr. Handy.” he pressed. “Surely a little missus would help.”

Jack shrank away slightly, and Edward stepped up behind him and smiled—too warmly—at the other man.  
Chiselled Jaw’s face fell slightly, the smirk turning more mean than jokingly jovial, and Jack said, blithely, “Edward takes cares of that! An excellent cook, too! And, er, no dealing with any in-laws!”  
The drunk in the green tie saved them by bursting into raucous laughter.  
“Lucky dog, no in-laws! Sure wish I could get rid of mine...say, d’you happen to know any other private chefs…?” he said.  
“I...think I might know a few you mght be interested in,” Ed said. He kept the smile up.

Jack made some vague, polite noise about needing to check on something, and then hurried away, leaving Edward to ‘chat’ with the shark, the drunk, and the woman with sore feet.

~

It was awhile before the rich wolves got bored of him and let him slip away. Mainly he’d had to field increasingly barbed questions about Jack, his habits, and why he needed a private secutiry guard in the first place, all of which Edward had answered with smiling opacity and vagueness enough to madden a sphynx. In the end the drunk had finally clapped him on the arm, said it was nice to meet him, and then reeled away, flagging down another group who were sitting at the couches. The others followed, Chiseled Jaw throwing him a cold, unreadable look as they went.

Edward found Jack in the kitchen, still nursing that glass of wine, despite not seeming to be enjoying it too much.   
He looked both uncertain and unhappy, standing with his shoulders hunched, in a corner and out of the caterers’ way; he kept glancing up and making polite, fragile smiles at the servers as they hurried around.

But his face lit up when he saw Edward approaching.   
Edward, who tried not to let his own eagerness show too much as he strolled carefully through the bustling space, smiling nd nodding politely at the servers he passed.

When he was close enough to lean nearer to Jack to talk, he murmured, “You all right there, boss?”  
“Everything is fine,” Jack said mechanically.   
Edward wondered what had been said in the conversation before he’d pulled him away. He wondered if this was a repeat performance for Jack. Considering how tense he’d seemed all night, even when exchanging pleasantries, implied the answer was yes.   
Edward made up his mind about something.

“Actually, I’m glad you slipped away. there’s something I needed you to look at, but I was going to wait until after the party...”  
Jack perked up a bit. “What is it? Is it serious?”  
“It would probably be best if you just came and saw it for yourself.”  
“What—what did you need to show me? What’s the problem?”   
“It’s outside.”

Jack looked shocked, but he followed Edward up the back hall steps, to the upstairs coat closet. Edward opened the closet and pulled out his coat and held it out for him to shoulder into it. Then Edward pulled his own coat on and ushered him through a door into the back hall.  
Wordlessly, he reached up and pulled down the attic stairs by the hanging cord, snapped them into place, and then guided Jack up.   
“Really, Edward--! Something that’s this serious might require the attention of the police, don’t you think?” he protested.  
“It’s...more in your line of expertise,” Edward said.

Then Jacks’ eyes grew huge. “Do you—did you see a craft? What did it look like? Did you manage o get a photograph?”  
“Can’t say anything,” Ed said, fighting to keep a straight face.  
But then Jack goggled at him, his eyes suddenly wide and sparkling. “Is it STILL HERE? Oh, EDWARD!”  
and THEN he hurried up the ladder, moving so quickly it wobbled a bit under his weight. 

It wasn’t until they were on the roof that Jack looked around and realized the truth.  
“Edward,” he said, with some disapproval. “There’s no emergency, is there.”  
“The way I see it, you trying to drink away an anxiety attack IS an emergency.”  
“I was hardly--” Jack began. Then he sighed. “I used to be—better at hiding them. Was I very obvious?”

“No. but the way that guy was ribbing you, it’s no wonder.”

Jack looked shocked, then embarrassed. He sidled over to the wall that Ed was leaned against, and crossed his arms over his chest. When he spoke next, he would not meet Ed’s eyes.  
“That’s Don Smith. The chair of the board at Parson’s is Doreen Dalrymple, his aunt. Of THE Dalrymples,” Jack said, with a little sneer. “He’s probably going to wind up as the mayor of Boston, someday. Maybe even the governor.”

Ed grunted once, but was too polite to say more.   
Jack continued, “And that’s the kind of...PERSON he is,” he made a bitter scoffing sound. “The kind of person Mother thinks it’s important to ‘be seen with’. I can’t understand the need my mother sees of being in the...in certain circles. I believe I’d be perfectly happy with my telescopes and my laboratory, and not much else.”  
Ed chuckled. “Man of simple tastes, eh? there’s nothing else you’d add to that list, if you had your druthers?”  
Jack snorted a little and gave Ed a playful dirty look. “Well, fine. I confess I’m human; there...MAY be some other things I’d take...”  
they both chuckled a bit.  
They stood a moment in companionable quiet, looking out over the street below, and the lights hung in the yard. Sleek cars were moving slowly through the evening gloom, and in one of the nearby houses he could see a Mr. Handy moving around on the second floor, behind the lit windows, pushing a vacuum cleaner.

Finaly, Jack spoke, his voice quiet against the road noise breaking up the evening stillness.   
“I...suppose I really should thank you, for bailing me out back there.”  
Ed shrugged one shoulder. “No problem.”  
Jack laughed. “To tell the truth, I can’t stand that man. i--”  
whatever he was going to say next was lost to the loud rumble of a freight truck passing on the overpass above them, the loud hiss of tires and the boom of the truck’s empty cab temporarily filling the night like an explosion.  
Jack watched its lights pass with an expression of sharp annoyance on his face.

“I can’t STAND those elevated roads,” he muttered. “There are few things Mother and I agree about, and that’s one of them; I swear, one day some...drunk is going to swerve JUST SO, and take his car over the railing, and the damn thing will fall right through our roof.”

Ed made a sympathetic noise and winced a little. The image was not a pretty one. It wasn’t something that was popular to talk about, but with most of the cars on the road operating with nuclear fuel cells meant that everyone was driving around bombs—more potent ones than even gasoline-fueled vehicles. 

“Mother would not have allowed such a thing,” he said softly. “We were abroad, in England, I believe, when they began construction...and by the time we returned, land was bought, foundations laid...”   
Ed nodded again, but inwardly froze. When would they have had time to do that? The flyover in question was almost thirty years old. He knew guys whose parents had worked on it, back in the day. Edward didn’t look like he was too far out of his thirties, if that.   
“I suppose we really ought to be grateful that the house is a historic landmark, or else we might not still be living here,” Jack finished at last.

“Can I ask a question?”  
“Of course, Edward!”

“Do you live away from home very often?” he asked. He tried to pitch the question gently, because the last thing he wanted was for the man to think he was trying to case the place, looking for when theyd be gone.   
Jack’s face shuttered for a moment—blank, then nervousness, then something very close to fear, all flitted across his expression, but in a moment he had himself under control again, enough to smirk up at Edward.

“If you’re worried we’ll leave you to guard an empty house, you needn’t worry. Mother and Emogene do the majority of the traveling these days; I’m simply too busy with work to be away that long. And my father needs at-the-moment care, so I really must be ready whenever I can be.” he said.

“Ah,” Edward said.  
Jack broke into chuckles. “Of course, if we should hire another guard half so trustworthy as you to take care of the house, we could take you along when we traveled. I think you’d like Europe! But, alas, until such time comes, I must tell you that, for the most part, you’ll be in stuck the house with only me. And, of course, MacGillacuddy,” Jack added.   
Ed snorted in amusement. “’Stuck’ here with you is a lot better than ‘on vacation’ in a lot of other places, these days.”

And then suddenly jack’s face fell, was completely serious.   
“You can’t mean that,” he said. “You don’t need to say you’d prefer to stay here, in the basement, to—to anywhere else. Goodness, I wouldn’t...i wouldn’t penalize you or anything for simply telling the truth.”  
they were both silent for another beat, long enough for another truck to go rumbling by overhead, as they stared at each other through the gloom of the night, through the dim wash of lights coming from the street below and the lights in the trees. 

Jack was the one who looked away first, his face and ears pinkened. “We...we really ought to get back inside before we’re missed,” he murmured.  
Ed followed him back inside, quiet, wondering if he’d said anything wrong. 

(okay, so, moving the party to a hotel, probs. The Rexford, because the Cabots are WAY too private to just have people all up in their house. Someplace where there is roof access and also an overpass. Or maybe delete this scene altogether; it doesn’t do much for the narrative… :/ )


	11. Outtakes Part 2

??? - Autumn

There were other times, later. Much later, as the interminable wars dragged on, as the government tightened rations, as lines outside grocery stores turned into lines outside military rationing centers, and as tent cities sprouted along major highways and in any unoccupied field. The police would break them up, only for them to reform later, a few miles down the road. 

Amid all this, Cabot House was a serene oasis, a time capsule forever lodged in the past, sliding forward through time like a tree parting mist.   
Edward worked as courier by day, guard at night, and erstwhile driver. And in payment, every year Jack gave him a small fortune.  
He could have bought three houses, with what he’d saved up.  
He sent most of the money to his parents instead. His father had had a heart attack and was mostly homebound, and his mother had finally retired; the money was much appreciated. But he’d be lying if that was the only reason he sent so much home. 

The thought of moving out made him feel tense and anxious. How else would he be there first thing in the morning to see Jack with his hair rumpled and soft and falling over his forehead, reading his paper in an old house-robe? Jack, after a beaker exploded or some piece of machinery overloaded, soaked to the skin from the emergency shower, but looking more frustrated and embarrassed than worried. Jack, laughing until his eyes watered and he had to take off his glasses to wipe the tears from his face. (It had been an awful archaeological pun, the details of which Edward had forgotten.) 

The hungry way Jack watched Edward as he moved.   
How thin the pretense was, some days, because he would watch Jack right back, feeling like his skin was too tight and he was overheating.   
And sometimes on his days off, he would stay in bed til late in the morning, chasing the image of Jack there, kissing him breathless with his hand on his cock. 

He didn’t know if it would have been better, or worse, if he hadn’t been allowed to see Jack at all.   
Maybe distance would have loosened the feeling; maybe if he’d moved out, he could have met smeone, and they could have been ‘bachelor housemates’ together.   
And then he thought of never hearing glass break and getting to jog up the stairs, to find Jack fussing about a chemical spill—of all things. He thought of never getting to sit together on the back deck with coffee in the morning, watching the boats on the river. He thought of never getting to listen to Jack simultaneously snark at Star Trek, and then in another moment mention how the technoolgy would be fascinating, if ever seriously explored.   
And the thought of missing him—in any capacity—was too much for him. 

He stayed in Cabot house, and slept in the basement, and sometimes when things were hard Jack would hand him something, and if their fingers lingered against one another’s for longer than typical, no one would say anything. If Jack asked him to come and look at something under a microscope—something he had to know Ed knew NOTHING about—but for the pretense of having Edward near him, close enough that they could hear each other’s breathing and smell each other’s aftershave. Nobody would bat an eye.   
If anybody had been there to see, that is; Wilhelmina was busy all day, and Emogene came home for only ahandful of months out of the year.

Still, they maintained their distance. Close enough to kiss, but far enough away for the distance to seem incidental.   
Edward wondered if it made Jack’s blood sing, too, or if he was the only one up late; but if the flustered way Jack would act if he saw him out of his usual slacks and blazer told him the truth. 

~

“There’s...there’s something you need to know,” Jack murmured. He spoke so quietly the sound was nearly lost to the waves; only Ed’s proximity helped him catch the words.  
Ed nodded for Jack to continue; Jack glanced around and then said, “One of the other reasons I...never approached you—aside from the issue of our professional relationship, of course—is that my family has a...sort of special issue which we try to keep mostly among ourselves. We are quite private, as you may have noticed...”  
“Is this about the portraits in the dining room?” Ed asked gently.  
Jack looked over at him, his eyes widening minutely.   
In an attempt to calm his rising panic, Ed held up his hands in a gentle, placating gesture. “It’s okay, Jack. It’s okay. I’ve known for years.”  
Jack looked away, and Ed felt a rising sense of concern; Jack looked ashen, rather than relieved.  
“Then you know why...why anything we have will be...different.”  
“True, yeah. But it already woud have gotten some raised eyebrows anyway,” Ed said.   
“I mean it, Edward. I...i do care for you, more than I’ve been able to say. it’s taken me two years to work up the nerve, and even now...” jack shook his head, and Edward watched his Adam’s apple bob in his throat as he swallowed. Finally he looked up at Edward, his eyes open and searching.  
“How did you find out?”

Ed hesitated a moment. Then finally he said, “There were a lot of little clues. The portraits. You mentioned remembering the overpass being built, and I looked it up and found the dates.”  
Jack chuckled, but the sound was more a quiet, mirthless huff of breath. “Very observant.” he looked away again, but sadness clouded his face, and his eyes were downcast.  
“It’s part of my job,” Ed said. Then, when Jack still didnt look back up at him, he reached out carefully and gently squeezed Jack’s arm. “Jack, please, don’t worry. I won’t tell anyone. And honestly, even if I did, I doubt anyone would believe me.”  
“I wish I’d told you sooner,” Jack whispered fervently. “I wish I’d fired you, so I would’t have spent so long tying myself up in knots over this being a conflict of interest.”  
Something else clicked for Ed; he smiled a little, but felt sad. “That why my checks are always so fat?”  
“Yes! And...well, Mother can be ver demanding, and I know we ask a lot of you. I couldn’t...i couldn’t...”  
Ed moved closer, raising his other hand to stroke Jack’s other arm as he stepped in front of him.   
“Hey, hey. Let ME make a confession too, okay?” Edward said. Jack looked up at him with sad dark eyes; Ed sighed and smiled. “Yeah, I could have just taken what you paid me after that first year and quit. But I didn’t. I just...i couldn’t stop thinking about you.”  
~  
jack drew in a shivering breath. “I’m—i’m so happy!”  
~  
(Later, when Emogene finds out, she gives Ed her version of the shovel talk, which essentially boils down to her telling him that he’s not the first, and that he’d better not die in a horrific accident (like Mr. Dr. Cabot #1) or leave him after a disagreement about some unprove-able theory (like Mr. Dr. Cabot #2) and break his heart.)  
~

(There were other times, other months)  
Jack kept fiddling with the pen, tapping it against his bottom lip as Edward double-checked the locks on the case, and finally as Edward couldn’t take the weight of hs eyes anymore, Jack murmured, “Mother is traveling to San Francisco for two weeks, to oversee the transfer of an imporant painting from the Fallon Gallery.”

Edward hummed a single noise of assent, still hesitant to show any real emotion outwardly, until Jack added, “Emogene will be eaving right after, to go stay with friends in Philadelphia.”

And THEN Edward allowed his imagination freedom, felt the heat bloom in his belly like the kick of good liquor.   
“Two weeks, you said?” Edward asked. He kept his tone light, almost businesslike. If anyone alked in, they could just be talking about vacation plans, or the weather.   
He thought about the chair in the corner of Jack’s lab, and sucked his bttom lip.   
Jack finally set the pen down, only to tug at the knot of his tie instead.   
“Yes. The house will be QUITE empty, for two weeks.”  
Edward managed a jerky nod, as he hefted the briefcase and glanced at the door. Jack bit his lips and smiled secretively, and Edward walked to the door in a daze of eager pleasure and anticipation.   
~  
Those weeks were magical, a secretive dream of a play-honeymoon.  
Edwrd ordered groceries and made them expensive little feasts—smoked salmon omelettes for breakfast, Southern-style buttermilk biscuits and Hawaiian coffee with real cream. Once, for dinner, he made them a beef and lamb stew with a list of ingredients as long as his arm, and for dessert, a chocolate cake with a heart-stopping amount of butter, and enough eggs to last a small family for a week. 

In the middle of a bite, Jack sighed in pleasure and put his fork down.

“Edward, this is absolutely FANTASTIC—divine--” he took another bite, sighed in pleasure, and shook his head. “You really COULD be a private chef. If yoy ever consider a chnge in careers, do please let me know. I’m sure Mother nd Emogene would be overjoyed; I know I am!”  
Edward shrugged a little, even as he felt his face heat in pleasure; when he put his hand back down, Jack reached over and meshed their fingers together on the table’s top.

When Jack went to work, Edward would send him off with thermoses of coffee or tea, and chaste, sweet little pecks on the cheek or forehead.   
Then he’d help MacGillacuddy clean the house for a bit; or he’d wash or detail the car. But the work was quick, and most of it light, and he was usually done before noon.

Then he would pack a lunch for himself and Jack, and he’d pick him up from Parson’s. He’d drive them to some nice, secluded outlook and they’d eat together; or he’d pick him up and they’d go to Southmann’s for coffee and doughnuts. 

They slept in Jack’s big bed and woke up early to spend the quiet hour talking, before the rest of the city woke up.   
Ed couldn’t think of the last time he’d been so happy in his life, and marveled at how it was all the small, domestic things—no ‘romantic’ weekend in a beach-house, no lavish getaway to a penthouse in New York.   
Jack would come home and practically bound down the stairs into the kitchen, where he would greet Edward with greedy kisses, which usually ended with one of them backed against a wall, or them stumbling down the stairs and into Edward’s narrow little bed. 

And then, one morening, while Edward was making batter for popovers and Jack had just put the old-fashioned coffee-pot on the stove, Patsy Cline’s voice cut out mid-song, and a man’s voice in a clipped, militaristic tone took over.   
Jack reached out to change the station before the broad-caster even finished the first sentence.   
“Wait a minute,” Ed said, and Jack looked at him with raised eyebrows. And then they spent several tense minutes listening…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Posting late while super sleepy. Apologies for spelling mistakes. Please enjoy~

**Author's Note:**

> So, i have Feelings about how Jack is...determined to a terrifying degree to save his father??? And yet the way Lorenzo talks about him in the journal implies that Jack a) didn't believe him at first, and b) Lorenzo thinks Jack is unimaginative. 
> 
> I got the feeling that Jack had a chip on his shoulder his entire life; he strikes me as the kind of man determined to Prove Something, whether to his father and his family or to the world. i think, in the beginning, he really WAS only using the serum to keep the whole family alive, so that he could cure his father and reunite them. but at some point it became more of a "gotta prove myself a Worthy Son" moment, and Jack is one stubborn bastard. 
> 
> i also feel like he was trying to redeem himself, in his father's eyes. like if only he could cure him, he would be absolved of not believing him in the first place; but i don't think that was the only thing between them. your dad is leaving on an expedition on the other side of the world and you don't go see him off? SOMETHING is up with that relationship! 
> 
> and i feel for him! he was trying to save his family so, so hard, but it's rather tragic to me, that his attempts to do so only dragged out their problems. i honestly think that if Jack couldn't cure Lorenzo, after pouring 400 years and no one even knows how much money into it, then nobody could have.  
~  
Emogene, i feel, is stifled by the lives they've been forced to lead. they're incredibly wealthy, but have no one, really; it's stated in the game several times that Emogene runs away from home ALL THE TIME and just...shacks up with whichever guy seemed most interesting in the moment. And yet it's obvious she's not allowed to actually DO anythng, even though apparently she's a master hacker. 
> 
> She wants to be able to live a real life, not just to hit pause and wait for jack to cure their father. While Jack is consumed with his research, she watches the world flash and die and regrow around them, and damn it, she wants to participate! To do SOMETHING!  
~  
Lastly, Edward, our viewpoint character, is cool and unflappable, just like in-game, and he's very, very observant. More later...


End file.
